No rapture? Hey, honest mistake.

Hey, everyone makes mistakes.

I recall believing wholeheartedly that the castaways from Gilligan's Island, after so many close-calls and with a professor who could build a radio out of Mrs. Howell's Cross-Your-Heart Bra, simply were not karmically meant to be rescued.

But in 1978, they finally were, after fourteen years and possibly a couple of Gilligan/Mary Ann love children.

When Fresca came out with two new varieties, Sparkling Peach Citrus and Sparkling Black Cherry, to compliment their classic grapefruit flavor, I sped to Safeway for a case of each. On the way, I pondered renting a back hoe to dig three deep holes, fill up each with a different variety of Fresca, and plunge rapturously backward into each on a sizzling summer afternoon.

Unfortunately, there would be no pools; the new flavors tasted worse than curried sand.

So who am I to judge Harold Camping, the man who predicted a May 21, 2011 rapture, the day Jesus would return to lift the righteous into heaven, while the remainder of the sinful masses would suffer on Earth until roughly Octoberish?

And this wouldn't be the biblical J.C., the guy who forgave everyone including his torturers, hung out with prostitutes and may have actually possessed a northern African ethnicity.

Nope, the dude who came back was going to be a Caucasian bad ass, and this time he'd probably be sporting a fresh crew cut and pulling a trailer filled with water boarding supplies.

Oh yeah, and he'd be clean shaven except for an awesome mustache.

Alas, Mr. Camping erred, and as far as I can tell, nothing happened. His rationale involved a complex numerological calculation, concluding that scriptural signs pointed to May 21 as the day of "harpazo," the Greek word for being "caught up," or "snatched up."

Have you ever read the Bible, especially the Book of Revelation? I can see how Gaming could've concluded that such nastiness was at hand, especially after so many prophecies have already come to fruition. For instance:


Revelation 16:1—"Then I heard a loud voice speaking from the temple to the seven angels: ' Go and pour out the seven bowls of God's anger on the earth."

Back in college, some of my fraternity brothers got a little drunk on a Saturday afternoon and made some chili. It was terrible, because they used ketchup instead of tomato sauce, and our president, whom we referred to as "God," told them to dump their bowls out in the alley.

Revelation 12:1—"Then a great and mysterious sight appeared in the sky. There was a woman, whose dress was the sun and who had the moon under her feet and a crown of twelve stars on her head."

Hello? Cher, Academy Awards, 1986. I'm not sure if she came out of the sky, but she may have been on one of those cherry pickers.

Revelation 13:1—"Then I saw a beast coming up out of the sea. It had ten horns and seven heads; on each of its horns there was a crown, and on each of its heads there was a name that was insulting to God."

Okay, this happened last summer. This aircraft carrier was docked in Seattle. I saw seven sailors walking out of the waterfront Red Robin, and man, they looked horny.

See? Maybe Harold Camping was simply off by a few thousand or million years. It doesn't mean it won't come down the way he's calling it.

But dude, enough with the billboards. You're making it look like Jesus has been in Cabo and he'll need to be picked up at the airport.