THE
BLUE BOX (Recycled Ideas)
by Don Cox
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I've given it a lot of thought, and I've decided that there
will be no more Blue Boxes this month. "Why have you
made such a major negative decision to the detriment of
all of us?" I can hear you saying. I imagine this question
being posed half in ennui, half in pique, but for the minor
fraction who might be mildly curious, let me give you the
complete response. The world or some major aspect of it
is slated to end this month, and I don't intend to be engrossed
in my keyboard and miss the whole thing.
You can find all about it in the prophesies of Nostradamus,
a frenchman who lived from 1503 to 1566. He had a lot to
say about politics and the weather. Just as an aside I might
as well mention the etymology of the word "politics"
at this point: "poly" is a Latin word meaning
"many", and "ticks" are blood-sucking
parasites. In any case, Nostradamus has had a lot of his
prophesies proven correct, but only after the fact. His
rhyming quatrains are somewhat obscure, and their meaning
is only evident after events occur that support them. Let
me give you an example. Here's a typical Nostradamus style
quatrain.
So hard they pushed the midnight stroke
It fell upon the walk
And all the ladies finally spoke
For those who could not talk.
This quatrain predicts the Quebec nurses' strike. The first
line gives it away, to "push hard" is close enough
to "Bouchard" to be an obvious fit. The midnight
stroke in France where Nostradamus lived is 4 PM in Quebec,
the time the nurses defied the back to work legislation.
Of course the nurses were really supporting the welfare
of their patients who were unable to speak for themselves,
that's the meaning of the last two lines. It's pretty obvious
when you think about it, but it would be difficult to figure
it out ahead of time. Nostradamus's prophesies are like
that.
I haven't read Nostradamus myself, my Latin is rusty, but
I understand that there is one solid date in all his work,
and it's the seventh month of 1999. He says that this month
there's going to be a monster descend on us and really mess
things up. Most people think this is the end of the world,
but personally I think they are just letting themselves
be stampeded.
No sense bothering your sensibilities with the literal
translation of the quatrains in question, it would just
confuse the issue further. Suffice it to say that it involves
a monster and some sort of major change of a cataclysmic
nature. The problem is to identify just what there is on
the present world scene that could fill these conditions.
The answer boils down to one of two choices. The first
choice for monster is of course Conrad Black, who is about
to become a member of the House of Lords. "Lord"
has traditionally had a supernatural connotation, and we
can anticipate Lord Black descending upon us with a blanket
of venomous words from himself and his endless mindless
minions. I think it fits. The second choice is Alan Greenspan,
a Washington homonculus who may decide this month to slay
the manic growth of the financial jungle with herbicidal
interest rates. He will be regarded as a monster, whole
corporations will fall screaming, indices will implode,
day traders will burn their keyboards.......
So that's the reason there will be no more Blue Boxes this
month, I intend to sit comfortably in the summer heat and
haze with a cool beer, and let Armageddon unfold around
me.
Bluebox ©2001 Don Cox
Website ©2001 OttawaWEB
