Like everyone else, I love a good doomsday scenario, but some are more entertaining than others. There's something dreadfully entertaining about the end times, whenever they're going to happen. Think about it. If you're one of the lucky ones, all those empty cars in the street--yours. All the jewelry in Tiffany's--yours. All the rotting food in the restaurants--yours. That is, of course, unless zombies or vampires or giant nocturnal spiders take over after sunset. 

And as for yesterday, where news agencies worldwide simultaneously created and assuaged panic by saying an experiment in Europe could destroy us all? I'm kicking myself for not listening to the The Sun's advice . There is a reason why debauchery is appealing--in those lovely moments before utter annihilation, personal ruin, or complicit seduction, you are almost glorious. Then hangovers, bankruptcies and unintended pregnancies rear their ugly heads and you wonder why you didn't just lean a little more left on that tightrope after all. The ancients had it right--you don't weep at the end of the world, you celebrate. 

I dabble in emergency preparedness like some people dabble in stocks. It's not because I want to survive in a post-apocalyptic nightmare starring Mel Gibson . It's because I'm afraid, as the late, great George Carlin put it..."that a little piece of hell will break loose. That will be harder to detect."

I am CPR-certified, have a first aid kit in my car, and because I live in a tornado prone area, a battery-powered radio, flashlight, water and food supplies for three days for Liontamer and myself. And if I never use these items, I'll be damn sure glad and won't be out my lunch money. 

I pity the poor people who spent thousands of dollars building bunkers and buying grain supplies in 1999, preparing for The Big one. Looks like they'll be eating wheat germ porridge for a long, long time--tortured by the nearness of McDonalds and Dairy Queen. 

And if the rapid punishment of Gustav, Hanna, Ike, and Josephine are really indicators of a global climate shuffle that leaves us all huddled in our libraries clutching Guttenberg Bibles hoping not to freeze to death , than I think I've made my peace and will find solace in a large bottle of Midleton Very Rare, Liontamer, and a ready made meal.