Gosh I love a good psychic. I even like the bad ones. The idea that we can peer into our own future is interesting because it seems to indicate that we value information about what will happen more than we value information about what IS happening. I give you this example:
I work as a programmer in a software house. We use software to track our progress on certain elements of the software we sell. This tracking system knows when we started working on pieces as well as when we finished and if we paused to work on something else along the way. We are also asked to predict for the software how long we think it will take us to perform a certain task. This is very important to the company, because they use that estimate to tell the customer how long they can wait for certain enhancements and features to be released. How is this similar? The Company is asking us to make prognostications based on nothing more than our guesses when we have software that already knows the average time it takes for us to work on any past element of the software. If we have an average that represents the time spent wouldn't that be more accurate than a bunch of knucklehead programmers guessing? One would think, and yet the company is much more interested in the predictions of their resident software psychics.
The other thing that makes it interesting is the whole phenomenon of the 365 days that it takes the earth to circle around the sun. Why is this special? I'm not sure, but it really seems important to everyone for all kinds of reasons. Our gravitational path around the sun is the clockwork that marks our ability to drive and vote as well as retire; Or whether or not we will get in trouble because we forgot our anniversary or someones birthday. It's amazing really.
Anyway. I'm going to give you the top predictions I could find from last year and couple them with predictions I've made up or found for the new year. Five of each.
10. 2009 Obama will be assassinated -
NOPE - I really shouldn't even bother putting this one on the list because every president that has held the office has had this onerous prediction pronounced every year. I'm listing it as last years prediction of 2009, but you could just as easily post it for the future prediction for 2010. It's really silly for anyone to pay attention to any psychic based on a prediction of a leader of a country to be taken out. I wonder if John F Kennedy has been talking at all to Jean Dixon on the other side about her predictions. I am pretty sure the secret service will be alerted to this blog as a result of my putting this on it. I should have thought of it a long time ago, it will probably double my readership. Hi guys, I think you do a great job and that whole thing with the presidential gate crashers was a hoax. Anyway, needless to say, the President is alive and well.
9. 2010 Bad year for Adobe - Adobe is the handy print format that made good on the wysiwyg promise with the PDF format. Adobe also makes Flash a widely used plugin for web browsers. Cyber-annoying people will be programming ways to make flash and pdf not work quite right on your computer. This will be interesting because it will signal the first year that hackers have targeted something other than Microsoft. I think it's because of the MAC/PC ads that Apple runs. PC is always the funny guy and Mac is always the straight man. I think hackers have finally gained a soft spot for dumpy old PC and started going after Adobe and their smug acrobatics.
8. 2009 There will be a knife attack on a top celebrity -
Probably - I got this one from a 2009 prediction website in England. Are they serious? This is what passes for psychic these days? Listen, claiming that some snot-nosed celebrity might have to put on a bandaid due to the errant handling of tools at a Beni-hana doesn't allow you to lay claim to a connection with the other side. Sheesh.
7. 2010 Wikipedia will be quietly taken over by a wealthy benefactor - Wikipedia, everyones favorite source for semi-reliable information to be quoted later as absolute gospel fact has been on the ropes for the last while, they have taken to begging in a public radio fashion for more money to keep the Encyclopedia Galacticus up and running. I think the only thing that will save it will be a rich benefactor that will quietly stop their whining and give them money in exchange for a few favorable articles that are willing to overlook more inconvenient truths.
6. 2009 - Global catastrophe from the environment -
Not bloody Likely - Speaking of inconvenient truths, I really couldn't let this gem go. There have been SO many predictions about the doom and gloom of the planet based on man's bad behavior, that I thought I would look into the archives and see what the predictions were for us in say 1975. a noted Harvard (yes THE Harvard) professor said '
civilization will end within 15 or 30 years unless immediate action is taken against problems facing mankind' his name was George Wald. There are tons of others, but this one is pretty out there. 15 to 30 years have long since passed and well, looks like we are still here. '
by 1995...somewhere between 75 and 85 percent of all the species of living animals will be extinct' Came from Look magazine in 1970. The only thing that seems to really be extinct is Look magazine. The green chicken little has been squawking as long as there has been money to be granted for scientific research. I'm not saying it's ok to run out and pollute your local watershed, but please, the sky is simply not falling.
5. 2010 - John Cusack will be cast in another disaster type movie - I really loved 2012. It was terrific. John Cusack was terrific in it and the movie itself told a great story. I love a good disaster movie because they are so easy to start and so entertaining to watch start. The problem is, the ending. How do you end a disaster movie that started so well? The answer posited by 2012 was 'you don't'. You let the disaster come and claim a victory for mankind. 2012 is still coming, surely there is room for dear John to Captain us through at least one more disaster.
4. 2009 - Jessica Simpson and Tony Romo will split -
WOW! HOWD THEY DO THAT?! - Amazing! How can this NOT be considered evidence of the supernatural? Absolutely shocking. I mean a young emotionally unstable starlet and a young emotionally unstable football hero couldn't find a way to make it all work? I saw this predicted in a hollywood 2009 prediction website. They actually had the guts to predict it. This would be a lot like me predicting that my boss would appreciate it if I would stay late once in a while to make sure work gets done.
3. 2010 - Drew Carey gets another
EXACT BID contestant - While I've been off for the holidays, I've resurrected a tradition that I only knew as a child. The watching of the Price is Right. As a child the only way I really knew I was sick or on vacation was if I could watch that particular show. Now that the venerable Drew has taken over for an increasingly crotchety Bob Barker, the show has taken on new life. I believe this will be the year that someone gets the coveted BOTH showcases for guessing within 500 dollars of the actual price but will in fact the the price spot on. This time Drew will act a lot more excited. The first time he did it, he seemed almost in shock.
2. 2009 - There will be a movement to increase the length of the school year for children. -
Amazing! - Granted, the movement was slight, but I do remember hearing our President talk about how all school should be much longer since the 'kids don't need to help with the farm anymore'. I guess he means the kids that aren't currently growing up on farms. The amazing Kreskin predicted this gem in 2008 along with some other tidbits that are interesting certainly. I don't know that it would be a BAD idea, except it is hard enough for us to go on vacation as it is, much less do it when there is no summer vacation at all.
1. 2010 - I'll stop writing this blog - It won't happen all at once, but rather I'll miss a posting (I've been like clockwork 2 times a month for 2 years). Something will happen to cause me to miss one. I'll run out of material, I'll be on an extended vacation, something. Then once I've missed one, it's like going off your diet, you might as well just go to Golden Corral and eat until they ask you to leave the 'salad' bar. Of course like other predictions, the future is hazy...
Happiest of new years to all of you!
If you are a consistent reader thanks very much. I really do enjoy writing for you.
If you just stopped by thanks to your search engine. I hope it's good for you.
If you are a friend I've lost touch with, It's never too late.
I wish happiness and health for everyone I can think of in the coming new year!!!!
- Get out of my way - I'm not really a big pushy person. I don't like to bluster my way through life. I rather get out of the way of people and remain largely unnoticed. If you are walking in a public thoroughfare and have decided that you are in some kind of musical where you can saunter your way down the sidewalk not really aware of who you are blocking while you are ambling along, just keep to the right, that's all. When it comes to driving, I change a bit. I change in that I assume only the fastest people remain in the left lane and the slowest go in the right. In practice, the fastest people are in the right and the slowest are in the middle lane with the medium speed people trundling along in the left hand lane where they don't belong. Please, just get organized and get out of my way. I'm not in a big hurry, but it doesn't mean I want to plod along watching you check your phone texts. It scares me.
- Quit driving like an idiot - I mentioned earlier to get out of my way. That's fine and well for me, but really you need to stop driving dumb. This includes merging in at the last minute, following someone in their blind spot, starting on a turn and then suddenly stopping, thinking your bike is a car, using your cellphone, testing your 4 wheel drive against the laws of winter physics.
