I don't know if it's hurricanes or a president who I suspect of being the anti-Christ, or a combination, but I have this vague feeling that cataclysm is at hand.

I imagine when Sputnik launched in the late '50s, people had a doomsday feeling, though I was much too young to remember that. Historically, there is nothing new about doomsday predictions. Still, times now feel extremely uncertain to me.

Here's what I think: Bush is so ludicrous that it's hard to respect anything he says and does. Surely there are those who want to bring death and destruction to the United States who are squirreled away somewhere laughing at his declarations about fighting terrorists abroad so we don't have to fight them at home. The idea that serious terrorists are going to be deterred by a guy like George W. Bush is absurd. Whether it'll be biological or some more traditional weapon, or some unleashing of poison gas or something, I hate to think. But I'm having an increasingly hard time believing that it's not going to happen any day now.

If not, then the natural forces of nature will catch up with us. A new strain of the flu or smallpox or something to wipe out half the population in a matter of weeks. A major earthquake. Some bizarre weather phenomenon. Aliens from another planet! (Just kidding on this last one.)

I have no idea why I have this sudden bout of pessimism. Could it be that I'm approaching 50? Maybe I'm just so scared of what the religious right is on the verge of doing to our country that, by comparison, it wouldn't be so bad if we did blow up and fall off the planet. I don't know.

How do you plan for the end of days?

I think you just go on doing what you do every day. Go to work, clean your house, go out with friends, go to the gym, go shopping.

But the big dilemma is this: should I stop saving for retirement?