The New Year is upon us, and — Big Surprise — the coronavirus is still with us! What we thought we were leaving behind in 2020 is staying around like an unwelcome guest who just won’t get the hint. Perhaps this is the year when we finally achieve some sort of herd immunity because the Omicron variant is just going to make us all sick. But don’t hold me to that. Here are some more “accurate” predictions that are “guaranteed” to happen.
January: The anonymous bill that would abolish the City of Key West starts gaining traction through committees at the Capitol. The Key West City Commission goes to DEFCON 2. The Old Seven Mile Bridge opens to great fanfare and spectacle, with all the people who used to walk and run on the bridge in the old days now tracing their old steps with their walkers and canes. The City of Marathon considers opening a Cracker Barrel in the building located at the Seven Mile Marina.
February: Florida Keys Day happens for the first time since the pandemic began, and local officials gather en masse to implore legislators to do no more harm. In a shocking development, the anonymous City of Key West abolition bill expanded in committee to include the Village of Islamorada, the City of Marathon, and the City of Key Colony Beach. Layton, somehow, was left out — possibly because no legislators had ever heard of it.
March: Gov. Ron DeSantis announces the release of a new form of ingestible monoclonal antibodies in the form of a breakfast cereal named “Monoclonies.” In legislative news, the anonymous City of Key West abolition bill makes it to the House floor. In an amazing attack on home rule, the bill is amended to include every incorporated municipality in the state. The Florida League of Cities implodes in fear and sorrow. A Tallahassee news story reveals that the municipal abolition bill is sponsored by VRBO and AirBNB, both of them eager to get those pesky municipal governments out of the residential neighborhood overnight hotel business. Further investigation reveals that VRBO and AirBNB have merged into an Evil Empire led by Emperor Palpatine and his Sith Lord Darth Anonymous, author of the municipal abolition bill. Legislators abandon the bill like a sinking cruise ship. The session draws to a close with a whimper, and the dropped hanky is noticeably damp with tears.
April: The City of Marathon changes its minds and decides to open a Last Chance Saloon at the site of the proposed Cracker Barrel. Galway Bay residents cheer the prospect of a neighborhood bar, but demand that the Florida Department of Transportation install a pedestrian overpass to keep returning bar patron residents from becoming Florida roadkill.
May: First of May, First of May, outdoor… never mind. Crane Point Hammock celebrates the amazing progress made on the old Crane House as well as May Day by releasing plans for the glass-walled “Expose Yourself To Nature” nudist resort previously reported in this column this past April. Nude druid dancing at the Sacred Pyramid on U.S. 1 will commence each night after the Brass Monkey closes at 4 a.m.
June: Sales of the Monoclonies cereal decline as COVID moves into a more endemic phase. Ivermectin once again becomes a drug primarily used for horse deworming. The Keys become overrun with visitors after NewsMax reports that nude druid dancing under a sacred pyramid at 4 a.m. is a sure cure for COVID. Please join us next week for part 2!
— Catch John Mondays at Boondocks, Tuesdays and Wednesdays at the Key Colony Inn, and Thursdays at Sparky’s Landing. www.johnbartus.com
