Ropin’ the Near Future With the Artist Formerly Known as Garth

Doomsday Revisited: People are once again freaking out over the year 2000, mainly because of NBC’s Sunday-night movie “Y2K,” in which computer failures on New Year’s Eve cause power blackouts, prison riots and other chaos, such as nonstop reruns of “Jesse.”

But here at Off-Kilter, we agree with President Clinton that there’s nothing to fear. To prove it, we borrowed Caltech’s experimental time machine and dispatched our time-traveling journalist to the year 2000.

Unfortunately, the machine’s on-board computer thought we meant 1900 and instead sent our reporter back to the McKinley era, where he encountered lingering panic over the so-called “Y-1900 problem,” in which doomsayers predicted power outages and jet crashes even though planes hadn’t been invented yet, and electricity was regarded as a tool of the devil.

After a brief round of partying like it’s 1899, our intrepid reporter returned to the present, and we tried again. This time, he successfully landed in the future, where he gathered information on key news stories leading into the new millennium:

* Dec. 12: Garth Brooks announces that he is tired of his alter ego, Chris Gaines, and will become either a Spanish flamenco dancer or Napoleon.

* Dec. 17: Tupperware introduces a line of clothing called Tupperwear, which includes Tupper hats (with a patented airtight seal to keep them from blowing off in the wind), Tupper neckties (which store hot beverages and snacks, so you never have to leave your desk for lunch) and Tupper eyeglasses, with plastic lenses that you can’t quite see through.

* Dec. 24: Santa’s sleigh crashes shortly after takeoff from the North Pole. When the black box is recovered--gift-wrapped--investigators quickly blame the tragedy on Rudolph, who apparently nursed a longtime grudge over the fact that all of the other reindeer used to laugh and call him names--and never let him join in any reindeer games.

* Dec. 27: Garth Brooks announces he will replace Santa Claus.

* Dec. 30: The dreaded Y2K problem is narrowly averted when the ACLU files a lawsuit claiming that the entire calendar system should be thrown out because it’s based on the birth of Jesus and therefore violates the separation of church and state. The Supreme Court agrees and, after drawing numbers from a hat, officially changes 1999 to 1547.

Loser of the Week: Here’s an incident that probably won’t make it onto “Rescue 911.” British paramedics responded to an emergency call on Sunday--only to be asked if they could revive a broken television.

Such requests are not uncommon in England, according to Reuters news service. One man phoned the emergency number to report a fight between two squirrels, and another called to complain there was nothing good on television.

Weird Polls Bureau: Percentage of Americans who say they would vote for Donald Trump over Al Gore or George W. Bush: 5.

Percentage who say they would vote for Heather Locklear: 6.

Best Supermarket Tabloid Headline: “Dog Reincarnation? Five Ways to Tell if Your Pet Was a Human in a Past Life!” (Weekly World News)

*

Unpaid Informants: Ann Harrison, Harper’s Index, Stephanie Goodman. Off-Kilter’s e-mail address is roy.rivenburg@latimes.com. Off-Kilter runs Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. On Tuesdays and Thursdays, we call 911 to report squirrel fights.