Doonesbury Say What?
Nov. 11th, 2009 09:50 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
thewayne"I've had two teenagers who were considering killing themselves, because they didn't want to be around when the world ends. Two women in the last two weeks said they were contemplating killing their children and themselves so they wouldn't have to suffer through the end of the world."
-- NASA Astrobiology Institute scientist David Morrison, on 2012 fears
/facepalm
I guess there's never a shortage of people like this. A friend of mine, whom I thought was fairly rational, moved to Idaho before Y2K. He bought two generators, had a year's worth of food, and who knows how many thousands of rounds of ammunition stockpiled before the year ticked over. I understand that all over the country you could pick up some really good deals on new, unused generators in January 2000 which people suddenly didn't need any more.
-- NASA Astrobiology Institute scientist David Morrison, on 2012 fears
/facepalm
I guess there's never a shortage of people like this. A friend of mine, whom I thought was fairly rational, moved to Idaho before Y2K. He bought two generators, had a year's worth of food, and who knows how many thousands of rounds of ammunition stockpiled before the year ticked over. I understand that all over the country you could pick up some really good deals on new, unused generators in January 2000 which people suddenly didn't need any more.
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no subject
Date: 2009-11-11 06:18 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-11-11 06:39 pm (UTC)Hmmm.... There's a game by Atlas that's a story-telling game where you're a mad scientist trying to invent a perpetual motion machine out of paper clips and over-ripe bananas, or other equally strange items. If you changed the story aspects to bringing on the apocalypse....
no subject
Date: 2009-11-12 04:02 am (UTC)Rewrote his hard drive. All info lost. Evil Rob had to call in the other techs to stare in awe at the one true Y2K issue.
As for 2012, all it really proves is that the Mayans were damned good astronomers. And quite honestly, if you're going to kill yourself to avoid the end of the world, either the end is going to be instantaneous and you won't feel anything, or you'll have ample actual evidence that the world is ending.
Personally, I'd rather not have MY world end prematurely, thank you very much.
no subject
Date: 2009-11-12 06:24 am (UTC)But the mini computers, HP9000s, died.
The vendor supplied a patch, which was dutifully compiled and loaded. But they didn't do the link/edit step after compilation, and when the time rolled over, it barfed big time and the dispatch system went down hard.
Fortunately they were prepared with their best operators working that shift and with lots of paper and pencils standing by.
no subject
Date: 2009-11-12 05:50 pm (UTC)If and when the end of the world happens, it happens. Why prematurely accelerate your own end instead of trying to grab as much time as you can before it all goes?
no subject
Date: 2009-11-13 01:09 am (UTC)In December 1999 I had an infant daughter. I stockpiled several months worth of diapers, some baby food, bottled water, maybe a month's worth of food for us (since I was still her main source of nutrition.) In effect, I spent a few hundred dollars prematurely on things that I most definitely would use regardless of whether Y2K happened.
For 2012...well, my theory is that the date could easily be a motivator for a major terrorist attack, so I'll prepare much the same way--except that both girls are out of diapers! If distribution is disturbed, my kids won't go hungry. If not, we'll eat it all eventually.
And if the end of the world comes...well, if one percent survives, I want my kids to be among them. Being there myself would also be a plus. ;)