More fake news from the NB archives

6th cent. BC. Buddha gets idea for reincarnation while visiting recycling centre.

33 AD. Jesus crucified, asks to be buried with 10kg of self-raising flour.

c. 150 AD. Ptolemy proves world is round. Shops that sold models of Earth now calling them "frisbees".

1450. Renaissance pauses for half-time break so people can clear backlog of witches and heretics to be burned.

1453. Guinness Book of Records congratulates England and France on completing Hundred Years' War.

1560. Nostradamus correctly predicts the Trump presidencies, but realises they are just too far-fetched for publication

1707. Act of Union - apparently. Scotland wakes up in bed beside England with huge hangover and no idea how it got there.

1842. Victorian society is shocked by the first Pirelli calendar, which features pictures of pianos with particularly attractive legs

1854. Alfred Tennyson in secret talks with Light Brigade: 'You provide the charge and I'll provide the poem.'

1901. Death of Queen Victoria sparks constitutional crisis as King Edward too fat to fit on stamp.

1919. Humiliating peace terms for WWI losers at Versailles, whereby Britain allowed to make one 12-part sitcom per year about beating Germany.

Includes contributions from FlashArry and deskpilot

Photo credit stockcake: museum-dinosaur-exhibit_262824_51875

Hanging chads and an ear miss

The Milky Way

Vega Edition

Sunday, 8th August 2027

still only V$35,000

We lament the passing of our near neighbours of Earth. It is by fine margins that civilisations fall and worlds collapse. Not so much a democratic planet, as one ruled in part by a leader of their 'free' world, yet elected by only one nation of many.

In the Earth Year 2000, a vote recount in the State of Florida saw great debate over whether hanging, fat, and pregnant 'chads' should be counted on punched ballot cards. Dubious inconsistency in that thinking, coupled with dubious inconsistency in what amounts to a 'popular vote', allowed a candidate by the name of Bush to slip past another called Gore into the Presidency of America by the narrowest of margins. The outcome was that a 'drill it 'n pump it' mentality to their planetary rock prevailed, rather than a 'let's look after our only home' attitude.

24 Earth Years later, a bullet grazed the ear of a reckless destroyer and the fate of humans was sealed. Indeed, the disappearance of all life turned the once blue-green globe to the orange-brown ball of fire we gaze upon this night with great pity.

Such beauty lost to such ugly mismanagement. RIP, dear Earth.

Picture credit: The Milky Way, Vega Editon. And Wix AI.

Effects of powerful solar flares experienced on Earth