1-800-HEAVEN

Tony Hendriks, Contributor

Now, I don't want to ruin your Sunday but someone ought to tell you the end of the world is not just nigh, it's here. Not coming, not on its way, not around the corner and not outside waiting to come in, no it has taken off its coat, is kneeling in your favourite chair and warming its buttocks in front of the fire.

I know because I overheard a group of women with extremely large bosoms saying so. They said it on Tuesday, repeated it vehemently on Wednesday, continued animatedly on Thursday, reiterated it vociferously on Friday and by Saturday they were bawling, howling and yelling it over and over and over.

The worst thing about this end of the world malarkey is it's not going to end very quickly. Judging by what I've seen so far it could go on for a very long time indeed, weeks, months, maybe as much as a year or more. If the civil service gets hold of it, God help us, we could be hanging around waiting until, well, until the end of the world.

Unfortunately this means that all the religious over-enthusiasts who stood by my gate, knocked on my door and tried to convince me to change my ways were right all along. I should have listened but alas it's too late as the large-bosomed ladies have informed that every place being saved for the select few to gain entry into the kingdom of heaven went ages ago. Damnation! For me, and the rest of us who get left behind that is.

However, when the time comes for the world to end it won't actually end for everyone, at least not all at the same time and we won't all go to the same place. At first it will only end for those who have a place saved for them.

So how do you save a place in heaven? Do you make a reservation online? Do you call 1-800-HEAVEN or is it like saving a space in the bank line where you stand there until someone arrives behind you and you say, "Soon come" then toddle off until your space moves to the front at which point you jump in line much to the chagrin of those who have been standing there all this time? If so I'm going to ask the girl who used to knock at my gate to save a space for me. She's going to heaven. She told me so herself.

It's a scary thought though, all those pious souls being right while we're left praying and paying for our sins. Hell! For me, and those of us who're left behind. Some people might think it doesn't sound too bad being left behind when the world ends especially if it doesn't, but things will never be the same! Sheriff Gee Dub Yah is saddling his horse, rounding up a posse and heading off to hunt Old Sammy Bin Laden who's been laden with the blame for the end of the world. Gee Dub Yah is going to have some mental fun muzzling Muslim Fundamentalists, says he'll do it if it's the last thing he does, and it might be.

"Dead or Alive!" posters are all over town but remember Custer, I say. No matter how big your cowboys are there's plenty more 'injuns' where they came from. Last time a president avenged America in that part of the world Thomas Jefferson won the war for Americans but in Tripoli's eyes the Pasha won it for them. This one's going to end in tears. Take my word.

One word describes the reason for the conflict: religion. A smaller one sums up the reason we'll see change: oil. A lack of the slow brown liquid means electricity, water, motor transport and God knows what else we take for granted, is going to grind the world to a halt. Jobs are lost not because of oil but because of turmoil, but they are the least of it. Lives, limbs and lucre will be lost before long.

We shall have to master a world where electricity is not high priority, water a luxury and motorised transport irregular at best. Environmentalists got their wish. I wish they'd been careful what they wished for. There's going to be worldwide, economic recession and depression more akin to the flood that floated Noah than the banks that sank in the 1930s Great Depression.

Fret not my fellow countrymen, the greatest redeeming factor in all this is that Jamaica has been in an economic recession since Independence so we're one of the few nations prepared to and capable of dealing with a catastrophe of this nature and dimension. Civil unrest is our staple diet, in darkness we shine and a life without water is commonplace, across our island people wash in rivers and rise with the sun. A new industry will emerge. Information Technology, be gone! Jamaica will teach the world Survival Technology, or How To Survive On Beer Minimum. We're already an example of how a Stone Age existence can be lived in New Millennium Style.

Tony Hendriks can be reread at www.JamaicanPaleface.com or e-mailed and roundly chastised via JamaicanPaleface@aol.com

Back to Commentary