Earwig photo by Rainer Hungershausen (flickr creative commons https://flic.kr/p/6NUhqY)
As Passover approaches, Boulder is pondering what plague might next hit the city. In 2012, the Flagstaff Fire loomed over South Boulder, threatening to burn down all of Devil’s Thumb and Table Mesa. The Flood of September 2013 was a 1,000 year rain and 100 year flood. It lasted for eight days (no relation to Hanukkah) as it caused unprecedented damage to Boulder County. Most recently, we experienced our snowiest February on record at 50.5 inches of snow. “That completely plagued out our old record of 32.1 inches in 2012,” remarked Mayor Matt Appelbaum.
Boulder Hippie Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi, the 89 year old professor of Jewish Mysticism who used to hang out with Timothy Leary in the 60s, died in July 2014 but came back to the earthly plane to predict that the next plague will be the “thick palpable darkness resurrected from Egyptian times.” He later retracted that and said that was probably just night-time he was foreseeing. He noted he had been tripping on LSD at the time of his prophecy. “My bad.”
Western Disposal feared bears would be the next plague, so they began retrofitting residential trash bins with bear-proof mechanisms to prevent what they felt was an imminent attack.
Conservative groups are readying defenses against their expectation of an unprecedented horde of young people attracted by the new recreational cannabis laws. Migration patterns for this species show they are likely to permeate this area around 4/20. Factions on the right fear that the youth vote will decimate the already declining conservative sphere of influence at the state capitol. The strategy for controlling this population demographic is to use pheromone traps. Once inside the trap, marijuana edibles will be used to render them harmless until they can be safely relocated to blue states.
Alex Krull and Austin Porzak, who became the first ever to ski the First Flatiron in March, said they fear nothing and dared God to “bring it on.” The two now have lucrative contracts representing Medline Industries which manufactures a wide array of neck braces and cervical collars.
Many residents say their worst fear is a plague of swarming earwigs. “Those insects remind me of the terrifying ‘pets’ Khan put in Chekov’s ear to make him talk in Star Trek’s The Wrath of Khan,” said longtime Boulder resident Organa Peace. Ms. Peace added, “They’re just so disgusting. I scream every time I find them in my garden hiding in the husks of my non-GMO corn.”
Weedpro, Inc. owners Bud, Mary Jane, and Herb Green, discounted speculation that earwigs that infest local cannabis crops might grow to frightening proportions due to the munchies. In fact, they argue that such a development might actually be helpful because instead of harassing city dwellers, the insects will be more inclined to hike up to the top of Boulder peaks and just hang out watching the clouds go by.
Xcel representative Volt Monopouli says there’s nothing to worry about from earwigs. “When you weren’t paying attention, we created a citywide electromagnetic field that can be used as a giant bug zapper. They won’t stand a chance.” When asked what the true purpose of the field is, he said that was unimportant and skillfully led the conversation back to earwigs.
Added Toxi Carcino of Encana Corporation, “I agree. Earwigs are no problem. If the giant bug zapper doesn’t work, we’ll get them with our network of fracking wells. We can create a coordinated catapulting mechanism in which they all shoot horrifying fireballs into the sky simultaneously, creating a sticky crisscrossing net of scalding poisonous contaminants. That stuff will stay active for hundreds of thousands of years. Case closed.”
The National Climatic Data Center at NOAA (the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) is working on computer simulations to determine if there is a way to rearrange plagues in the future. Senior Plague Analyst and Climate Reconstruction expert Flux Environ believes he can develop a metamodel in which the record-breaking snows and floods descend upon the massive fires thus nullifying them all. Claims Mr. Environ, “If we can catalyze the international effort to utilize global data and improve our understanding of earth climate variables, we can model inter-annual to centennial-scale environmental variability. Paleoclimatology perspectives create a revolution in informatics with metadata in a chronology table. We will all be saved!”
This post originally appeared in the 2015 April Fool’s issue of the Blue Line.
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