THE FINAL COUNTDOWN
Web Column for 24:7

I never thought I'd be the one to succumb to millennium fever. I've always been relatively rational (uh-huh...) and certainly never one to follow the herd in any kind of pre-millennial tension. However, the dawn of 1998 has convinced me that the end of the planet is round the corner. But it won't happen in 2012 (as Terrance Mckenna believes) and it won't be an Armageddon blessed Hogmanay 1999. I'm actually convinced that's its all going to go pear-shaped in about a fortnight. White sharks off the coast of Shetland, projectile volcanic action, cloning of human armies and teleportation have all been discovered since the beginning of January. And the big kiss-off is going to be Valentine's Day, just you wait and see.

That accepted, it's time we got off this miserable Earth and launched ourselves into orbit. We could therefore consider signing up with the Civilian Astronaut Corps, but their first flights are not scheduled for take off until July 4th 1999 and we'd have to shift our lardy backsides over to Galveston in Texas (the site of the rumoured Glen Campbell alien abduction). The CAC have constructed the CAC-1 rocket-powered vehicle which will provide transport seventy miles due up for their 2,000 members and it will use the ocean as its runaway. Simultaneously intelligent, environmentally sound and stupifyingly romantic - CAC seems like the perfect combo for low-orbital flights. Unfortunately, it's only sixty miles above the Earth's atmosphere and so those boys and girls ain't really going to get us into space.

Ditto Space Adventures Inc. [ www.spaceadventures.com ]. They will take us eight miles lower to an altitude of only 62 miles and are "estimating" a final flight cost of up to $100,000. Deposit five of those big ones right now and you can reserve your seat on their flights in 2002. The company don't have their own spaceship and therefore all the in-flight goodies they can promise thus far are "a small snack as recommended by our space nutritionist". Caffeine will most likely be banned as they "do not anticipate that normal bathroom facilities will be available". Must remember to pack that colostomy.

Assuming that we can finally get up there (via teleportation, telekinesis or just by furious back-pedalling), we should really try to catch up with the Island One Society [ www.islandone.org ]. They have set up a virtual "meeting place for future space colonists" and are looking to create and administer libertarian free settlements all over the solar system and beyond. They have a variety of suggestions for how such settlements might survive on the surface of the Moon and over on the Big Red One.

No matter how forward thinking and wavy-davy new age you think such organisations might be, the only worthwhile organisation to affiliate ourselves with would be The Association of Autonomous Astronauts [ www.uncarved.demon.co.uk/aaa.html ]. The AAA exist to kick start independent community-based space programmes, but are adamant that we should leave all our Earth-bound preconceptions behind and get down to some serious evolution. This, for example, involves preparing ourselves for zero-G through getting high by other means (if you catch my galactic drift) and ridding our heads of any out-dated notions of the 'up' and the 'down'. Stand on your head and hold your breath for half an hour twice a day and you too could be at the astronknot front line.

All this is irrelevant however as we're going to blink out into balls of pure thought by mid-February. When it happens, we won't even feel it and we'll laugh at how ridiculous and old fashioned "flesh" and "bone" really are. Because at the end of time, mankind will be able to look back, have a big puff on an enormous space joint and marvel at how it was all just one big ride. Ad astra to the stars, man.

back to text | back to top