Preview

Excerpt from the upcoming 'End of Days, The Complete Annihilation of the Human Race, or Just a Beautiful Dream?'

Part One:

The Idiot Apocalypse

(Found in a time-capsule from the future that some idiot had buried backwards)

    And there came a day in Earth's history when the unimaginable, the unthinkable, the inconceivable, occurred. The last idiot known to man (his name is not important yet), died in, as you can probably guess, an outlandishly stupid manner. He was checking on the readiness of his lunch, and had just opened the oven door, when the majority of his head was blown across most of the kitchen, not so neatly shredded off right around the lower mandible. Things might have turned out differently for the entire human species had he not, at the last minute, wondered if perhaps his can of baked beans could do with just a little more baking. Hell, he could even have baked them without incident if he'd only thought to open the can first, or at least poke a hole or two in the lid. Nope, straight into the oven and let's just crank 'er up to around 475. Opening the oven door allowed a rush of much cooler air to hit the already stressed to maximum can, giving it that one, last push over the top, and it blew up faster than an inflatable doll in a monastery. The last thing he saw caused the last conscious thought he would ever have, which was,  

“Shit. Thought I'd bought the one without the gooey piece of pork fat.”.

Alright. In reality, there is no way that could have happened. I took a little license there with the pork fat. His actual last thought was, simply, “Shit.”.

    Now, you would think that the practical upshot of this event, the loss of mankind's last surviving idiot, would be something of a bonus to the rest of the species, but you would be wrong. Within hours of his death, the final few decent ratings enjoyed by reality TV shows and sitcoms about mixed families raised by single gay fathers took a nose-dive. The entire entertainment industry flew into mass panic; no one had ever imagined that idiots would someday be in short supply, hence, no one had ever come up with a contingency plan. Writers hadn't thought of writing anything that did not target the lowest common denominator, Studios hadn't requested anything above that same level, and Producers were still ecstatic over the fact that anything that aired under the catch-all definition of 'Reality TV' was an instant hit. Not only that, but these programs cost virtually nothing to produce – no major stars, no writers, no vast, expensive sets, no distant locations, nada!

   

   The industry's panic quickly carried over to the Sponsors, who immediately withdrew their sponsorship, and the result was the total collapse of every single television network on the planet except for PBS. Apparently, they had seen this coming since the 1970's, but no one took them seriously, thinking it to be part of some pledge drive or other.

    The collapse of all the networks got people to thinking, hey! What if the same thing happens to important institutions that actually matter? That could turn out to be a negative thing! And so the search was begun for more idiots to enjoy the programs and buy the products they were told they needed during each commercial break. The United Nations voted, and the hunt started, logically, in the birthplace of idiocy itself. Teams were sent out all over North America, desperately seeking some lost, unknown pocket of secret, hidden idiots.

    Days passed fruitlessly, stretching into weeks. Was it possible that any remaining idiots were smart enough to successfully evade the search teams? Well, no, as one PBS executive pointed out. If that were the case, then they would have evolved and would no longer be idiots, now would they? Again, panic gripped the world. No idiots left? None? What the hell are we going to do? We've already seen the downfall of the entire entertainment industry, (Not, you, PBS), the Retail industry reports that 80% of the products offered for purchase are just sitting in warehouses, collecting dust, and McDonald's has completely disappeared off the face of the earth.

   

   An emergency meeting of the United Nations was called and every single country on the planet was represented, for the first time in history. The result of this meeting was a plan so outrageous, so undreamed of, that most people had difficulty even believing it at all. Mankind would, for the first time ever, attempt to intentionally breed idiots...

To be continued...

Until next time, as always, be safe!

TRS