Preparing for the Apocalypse

It has been predicted that the world is going to end on 21 December 2012. This column will now be dedicated to detailing exactly how prepared I am for this inevitable Apocalypse. The answer, as you will see, is 'TOTALLY FUCKING VERY'

Feature by Fred Fletch | 01 Feb 2012

I guess the best place to start in preparing for the End Of The World is with the worst case scenario: DEATH.

Being a forward planner I decided to think ahead. I wouldn't rent Roadhouse and not have Kleenex and a cigarette ready so I'm sure as hell not going to be exploded without knowing what comes next. Because the holiday brochure the Church supplies fails to go into details as to the location and dress-code for the afterlife, I realised that I would need to find some user reviews like on TripAdvisor.co.uk. Sadly the ethereal realm has poor internet connectivity and all contact would have to be made old-school.

Devices for contacting the dead have been around for millennia, with historical records showing that the Ancient Chinese invented Twitter for ghosts around about the same time they invented wearing-5-pairs-of-underpants and coroner reports with a tick box for 'MURDERED BY POLTERGEIST'. Ouija boards first became commercially available to the general public in the late 19th century when businessman Charles Kennard realised that a tool for summoning supernatural forces would be a whimsical alternative to evenings spent not prank calling Satan. His company ultimately marketed Ouija towards children as a board game similar to Snakes and Ladders except the only snakes involved would probably be coming out of your sister's eyes. In terms of suitability for children, the makers of Ouija would have been better off letting children aged 6-14 Skype with John Wayne Gacy.

Clearly the dark arts of necromancy would be the quickest way to discover what awaited me on the other side of the apocalypse and I promptly did the smartest anything ever and ordered a Ouija board from the internet. Given the fact that my online purchase history currently reads like a list of things police might find in the burning ruins of Lo Pan's underground temple, paying $10 for an ill-advised ghost-summoning board game hardly seemed like the craziest thing I've done.

I ended up ordering my board from a private seller who claimed to be the high priest of something called Sunblood Church, a secret religious organisation so secret Google didn't even know who the fuck they were. Despite existing less hard than Tom Sizemore's erection, Sunblood Church seemed relatively well stocked in the sort of thing you might find looting a chest in Skyrim. Spectral candles, silver bullets and holy water were all available including a self-published book, Fighting Phantoms: A Guide To Combating Ghosts and Malicious Spirits. Penetrating the realm of the undead is obviously no laughing matter so you'd be crazy not to pay an extra $3 on 20 pages of how to punch invisible vampires.

With the order placed I could look forward to personally asking Viggo The Destroyer what I needed to pack for heaven within 3 to 4 working days.

...2 weeks passed.

I am no NASA-postal-scientist, but I had always assumed it took a lot less than 14 days for a crazy person to put a wooden hotline to the devil into an envelope and send it to Edinburgh. Upon emailing the mysterious seller as to the status of my Ouija board, I received an almost instant response apologising sincerely and blaming the delivery delay on both the death of a Church member and an unexplained fire in their stockroom. Since I have no idea what 'ominous' means I happily accepted his apology and it arrived 2 days later.

I am now the proud owner of a genuine spiritual communication board and can confidently tell you that Ouija worked better when I didn't have it. Maybe I am using it wrong because one month of screaming "IS ANYBODY THERE?" at the alphabet has failed to reveal even one ghostly secret. Sunblood Church failed to include any instructions, perhaps believing that the kind of person who orders a powerful weapon of witchcraft from an anonymous internet man would have more balls than literacy.

In conclusion: I have fallen at the first hurdle. I am completely unprepared for death and I now have to focus all my attention on everything opposite of dying. You hear that apocalypse? I have two months left to beat you.