2012 Apocalypse Grab Bag

Note: Cross posted from Rubble.

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From 2011-11 (Nov)

 2012 Apocalypse FAQ: Why the World Won't End | 2012 Doomsday Theories & End of the World | Dec. 21, 2012 | Space.com:

Just as the calendar you have on your kitchen wall does not cease to exist after December 31, the Mayan calendar does not cease to exist on December 21, 2012. This date is the end of the Mayan long-count period but then — just as your calendar begins again on January 1 — another long-count period begins for the Mayan calendar.

10 Failed Doomsday Predictions | End of the World & Apocalypse | LiveScience:

Most prophets of doom come from a religious perspective, though the secular crowd has caused its share of scares as well. One thing the doomsday scenarios tend to share in common: They don't come to pass.

Here are 10 that didn't pan out, so far:

End of the World? Top Doomsday Fears | May 21 Doomsday, 2012 Doomsday | Apocalypse Scenarios | LiveScience:

With more and more technologies able to wreak mass destruction, a greater knowledge of what cosmic threats our planet faces, and more forms of media capable of trumpeting Armageddon, it seems as if there is more hype than ever about one supposedly impending apocalypse or another in 2012, despite all the failed doomsday predictions over the years.

Here are 10 apocalyptic scenarios that have raised fears about the end of civilization, in alphabetical order.

The Draw of Doomsday: Why People Look Forward to the End | Apocalypse & Armageddon | May 21 Judgment Day & 2012 Doomsday Hype | LiveScience:

According to DiTommaso, the apocalyptic worldview isn't uncommon. At the extreme end are people like Camping or Aum Shinrikyo, a Japanese doomsday cult that carried out sarin gas attacks on the Tokyo subway in 1995. But doomsday appeals to the secular and well-adjusted as well, through books such as Cormac McCarthy's "The Road" (Knopf, 2006) and movies like "The Terminator" (1984). Meanwhile, economic hard times and crises like Japan's earthquake and tsunami have spiked interested in survivalism and "prepping," or stashing food and supplies in preparation for a coming collapse.

Apocalpytic beliefs have been on rise for the past 40 to 50 years, said DiTommaso, who has been researching doomsday believers for an upcoming book, "The Architecture of Apocalypticism." What ties these disparate groups together is a sense that the world's problems are too big to solve, DiTommaso said."

Source:LiveScience

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We're having a rapture... again... really? And another satellite is falling? Maybe it is the end of the world as we know it?

Forgive me if I keep my plans for tomorrow instead of dropping everything to prepare for post-rapture looting this time...

Then again, we've also got a satelite falling, making today a "two-fer"!



Retrovirus Lab: Playlist: When Stars and Gods Fall Burning to the Earth: "Soundtrack for the scheduled rapture & falling satellite today.      "

'via Blog this'

Democracy In Distress: Today is the day when A Man Comes Around... Rapture 2011!: 
"Well, according to very few, that is. Personally, I'd be looking forward to a little looting, but I haven't been getting enough sleep the last couple weeks to feel up for the zombies that many others are predicting for today. Knowing life, that means zombies, surely.

I mock a lot, but this is why shit like this is actually very dangerous...

Pets Seized From Sonoma Co. Man Planning Pre-Rapture Killings May 20, 2011 11:57 PM

BOYES HOT SPRINGS (CBS 5) – On Friday night, animal control officials in Sonoma County seized three animals belonging to a man who planned to euthanize the pets ahead of Saturday’s predicted “Judgment Day.”
...
“I plan to put my babies to sleep when the earthquake hits Denver,” said Tinker who thinks that a massive world-wide quake will signal the beginning of the end. “I don’t want them to suffer.”

Now, on with the mocking."

'via Blog this'

Democracy In Distress: Heez'a comin' tomorraw?!? Really? The Rapture is on a Saturday? Naw.: 
 "Ah, shucks... I've got nothing to wear. Great quote from the billboard video: "This is how religion hurts people."


Now I know I shouldn't be mocking people's deeply held spiritual beliefs, but I have a hard time seeing this as really being a deeply held spiritual belief for most sane Christians.

Anyway, unless some words I said back in Assembly of God Sunday School back when I was in elementary school really do get me out of jail, er, hell for free, then I suppose I will be available for a good bit of post rapture looting."

'via Blog this'

Rubble: UARS reminds me of Mir... (Updated!): "This whole deal with the re-entering satellite reminds me of [Mir], or the Wim Wenders movie Until the End of the World, though with less risk of the world ending."

'via Blog this'

Photo of the Day by the King of Spamalot & "Mountain Cats" by Talkdemonic

From 000-FB Photo of the Day

Photo of the Day, October 12, 2011.  Taken October 17, 2009.  Butte Creek Scout Ranch. Near Scotts Mill, Oregon.  October 17, 2009.


View this photo and buy prints on deviantART. 

 I am the King of Spamalot.  I just had an email go out through ReverbNation to about 56 people I know about being a part of a mailing list I am putting together (though will probably never use).  I didn't think much of it, since it is to people I know.

A few minutes later, though, I realized that my name might not be on it anywhere, just Retrovirus Lab.  So yeah, that was me.  Let's see if I just got myself kicked off that service!

On top of it, as I am connecting with some other groups through these sites, my social networks are getting pretty jammed up with notices.  I am trying to keep them on the Retrovirus Lab page, not on my regular Facebook page, but they tend to go their first before I can get them off.  Only leaving the really good ones up there.

Good ones like these folks below.  Here is a song, just for the hell of it...  Discovered them on my travels through the interwebs today...

Probably won't get to a picture today, either.  So I threw one up at the top of this post and am calling it the Photo of the Day.

Meanwhile, everyone was home sick today.  Everyone, but me, is feeling better now.  Blah.  Maybe that can be my excuse...

Cross posting this everywhere...

Time to retire the old header...

This one hasn't been up that long, but it is time for it to go...

Democracy In Distress dates back to George W. Bush's re-election in 2004 and is the home for my political writing and discussions of current, topical issues.

Anyway, been working on some changes to all four of the blogs.  The two old ones and the two "new" ones.  Well, one is just moving over to Blogger from Live Journal, but the other is a brand new one centered around music and my once and future band/whatever project.  So, for now, it is pretty much just a dumping ground for music clips and related minutiae.

So,  a lot of work tonight for some minor cosmetic changes...  However, everything is a little bigger, so there is room for bigger pictures, bigger videos, etc...   And that meant going through some dusty corners of my hard drive looking for the original image files for the headers for both this blog and Rubble.  So it took a minute.  And now I am done.

Turn Me into a Liberal

I just had an odd idea for a website: turnmeintoaliberal.com.

Each week or so, we'd post a profile of a Bush Voter, from middle of the road swing voters to hardcore theorcratic conservatives, and their reasons for pulling the Elephant Lever in November and then we would use post comments using logic to try and change their mind.

Unfortunately, this would have been better before the election, but we do have the 2006 Congressional Elections coming up quicker than we can blink.

I am not putting this together yet, just sharing the idea. I think it would be good practice for taking the message to Red America.

This idea probably came around because I consider myself a centrist, but things are moving so far to the right in this country that I feel like I am turning into a Liberal myself.

I don't know... it would be amusing. I don't know which would be better, creating fictional Republican profiles or finding real people to submit to our assaults.

Today is Sunday. Douglas Adams wrote about an immortal being who went insane because of Sunday afternoons. But that is a better topic for my personal blog, Rubble.