Take it from Snee: Join my 2010 campaign

I, Rick Snee, am throwing my hat into the ring and am officially campaigning for 2010.

No, I’m not running for office. The mere fact that I, me, am qualified only reflects how unqualified most other elected officials are. Besides, the pay’s terrible, the old guys are creepy and–because I insist on burying my own hookers myself–the hours are long.

I am campaigning for the fight of the decade: how to pronounce 2010. While some may opt for the trite “two-thousand-ten” pronunciation (which says little about their personal hygiene or moral fiber), I am a firm believer that it is time for this nation to grow up and call it Twenty-Ten as God meant it to be called.

Now, I’ve run failed year pronunciation campaigns before. I lost the 2001 fight to call it Twenty-Aught-One, the “aught” harkening to the first decade of the 20^th Century, which saw rapid scientific and technological progress and the greatest metaphors when said technology exploded and/or sank.

Yes, I lost that fight and 2001 through 2009 were pronounced as “two-thousand-and-one.” Is it any wonder that we’re still using the same technology we used in the ‘90s, only marginally faster? Frankly, I’m amazed that we didn’t resort to 1000-era living conditions. (Not that New Year’s Eve 1999 didn’t try.)

It is because of this regressive, fuddy-duddy naming that, as we approach 2010, we still have:

• No flying cars
• No food in pill-form
• No moon bases
• Pre-torn denim jeans

So, if you’d like to continue “ironically” celebrating the past century with lame retro t-shirts and ground-based cars (that run on dinosaurs!), by all means, call 2010 “two thousand ten.”

I and the other geniuses, however, will call it Twenty-Ten, and here’s why we’re awesome (and you’re not).

“And the 2010 award for Best Actor …”

… could very well go to a robot.

Isn’t it about time we replace wooden stock actors like Nicholas Cage with actual automatons? By Twenty-Ten, the world is ready to pay and berate human celebrities who don’t actually hold jobs, it’s not like the robot actors will starve our breast-implanted blondes.

But, if it’s merely “two-thousand-ten,” then get ready for another year where the backwater foreign film cleans up … just as it did throughout the 20^th Century.

“The Detroit Lions are your 2010 World Champions!”

Twenty-Ten is so dystopic (read: Blade Rawesome) that the team from the most dystopic city in current American history–the dilapidated, practically abandoned Detroit–is the only one prepared to win a football game on a burning field where it rains Sears catalog pages.

But, if it’s merely “two-thousand-ten,” then here comes another Super Bowl win for Tom Brady and we’ll see Old Man Favre again for “two-thousand-eleven.”

“We’re watching as the last lucky remnants of the human race depart in The Spirit of 2010.”

By Twenty-Ten, the world is ending so perilously, yet slow enough like Titanic that there are romances and last ditch attempts at redemption before the world cataclysmically explodes, is conquered or freezes over into very sharp spikes.

But, if it’s merely “two-thousand-ten,” then the world continues:

• More PTA meetings
• More carpooling with that guy who thinks he sounds like every lead singer on the radio (who all sound like Chad Kroeger)
• More movies of TV shows with “zany” casting choices (“Paul Giamatti, a stooge? Zany!”)

I don’t mean to sound all emo, but if the world’s gonna end, shouldn’t it at least look like the cover of an ‘80s metal album cover?

This is it, voters. This could be the beginning of the greatest or worst decade ever, or more of the same crap we’ve put up with for the past twenty years. By using the Twenty-Ten pronunciation, we’re reprogramming our mindset to actually think we’re in the Goddamn Future …

… and–for once–not that 10-minutes from now, maybe I’ll have a Pop Tart, let’s play video games with our stupid hands future.