The Future only an Hour Forward Away

The Future only an Hour Forward Away

I have over six clocks, 4 watches, a clock on the microwave, stove, toilet and refrigerator in my bachelor pad. On the early evening of March 7, 2020. I thought I would get a head start on changing each clock and the watches one hour forward after my friends and some covetous competitors left the poker party. I hosted at my condo.

I can say that there was a lot of drinking and smoking and not all of the smoking weren’t from cigars, if you get my drift. People were coming in and out from Friday up until Saturday at 11:31 pm when the poker party ended abruptly.

My nosey upstairs neighbor Mrs. Dennison had called the police several times complaining that she witnessed a murder in the hallway on the floor below. There was going to be a tenant hearing later on during the coming week to have her committed and removed from the premises. She once called the FBI because she believed that someone was trying to break into her condo. It was her half blind dog trying to find the toilet.

Anyway, after all the clocks and watches were moved ahead one hour I went to bed feeling like new money, especially since I won over 2 grand in poker chips.

When I awaken I hear strange sounds coming from outside of my bedroom window. The first thing I noticed that I’m not in the same bedroom that I remembered going to bed in last night. I look at the huge digital clock hanging above my bed that is 4ft off the floor in suspended animation. I fall out of the floating bed as the clock with the voice of Fran “the Nanny” Drescher in that vexing nerve racking squeaky voice shouted it’s 6am. Good morning, Mr. Crom and the date is Monday March 9, 2062.  The temperature is a steady 28.8 Celsius. With no acid rain in the forecast.

I’m feeling a little like Rip Van Winkle. That was the dude who fell asleep in the Catskill Mountains and woke up 20 years later, having missed the entire Coronavirus pandemic. The sound that I’m hearing is caused by some flying saucers looking cars. Later on, I soon discovered that they were called TF-X in which could fly at altitudes above 1,400 feet and speeds way above 300 miles per hour.

I got to seriously thinking that maybe ole Marty my pharmacist chum had slipped one of them date rape pills into my gin and tonic, because after I won three hands in a row he insisted that I drink up.

I come from staring out of the window. My condo must have been remodeled while I slept for those 4 decades.

On the bed was a remote control. I pressed the bed to ceiling button and the bed started rising to the ceiling and fit into a circle hub surrounded by lights all the while the instant dining room and living room was being set up coming from the wall that the bed and clock once hung. The nightstands and Tiffany lamps disappeared somewhere beneath the floor.

I wished I would have checked to see if I left one or more of my wake up joints in one of them nightstand drawers. I got that weed from some West Jamaican dude who was getting deported on the following Monday.

 I gave up drinking coffee a long time ago when it was discovered that coffee will make you black according to my late grandmother when I would ask her if I could have a cup of coffee.

You see I’m a realist, so I didn’t have a problem dealing with my new surroundings. I wasn’t quite sure I liked the pajama outfit of the future of those string bikini thongs and my male nipples slightly covered with glittering and swirling nipple tassels I was wearing, but all in all I was liking living in 2062 thus far.

When I went over to the little kitchenette area the microwave/refrigerator had any kind of food you desired so I pressed the cold pizza and a box of Domino large pizza and a glass of ready to drink Ovaltine chocolate milk appeared. Later on, I would be pressing the KFC button. Extra crispy of course.

In the corner of the spacious room stood a strange looking opal shaped object. It was shaped just like one of those miniature plastic Renuzit air fresheners. I perused the bottom of it, and it was called a Roca Cocoon Shower and Bath. There was a good thing there was a speaker button on the outside of it with instructions that when pushed would tell me that it had a bathtub, hydro massage, shower into a single enclosure. Moreover, it featured a customizable lighting system that let me set the mood for any occasion. I chose Sex on the Beach for some desirable reason.

My ex-girlfriend left me about 3 months ago because she claimed I was too insensitive to her needs. It wasn’t my fault that she got her leg ran over and mangled trying to chase down a bus and slipped.

While being comforted by a shower that hit all the spots I got to thinking what kind of job did or would I have in the future. When I stepped out of the shower a warm blowing wind hit me like I was at the end of an automatic car wash.

I heard a phone ringing from a speaker on the ceiling. Hey, Afolabi! The voice shouted. Hurry up! You know how Mr. Spacely gets when were late. I say who am I talking too. He said, my African friend I know you were a bit out of it on Saturday after the poker game, especially how you talked on the speaker phone to your ex Cindy on whether she should have her deformed looking leg amputated. You said, in drunken Swahili: kwamba moja nzuri ya kuangalia mguu ni bora kuliko kuwa na mguu hakuna Ugly haifai. Translated: that one good looking leg is better than having no ugly unattractive leg. I could hear her crying. He didn’t know that I caught her cheating on me with the Mr. Universe looking 20 year old door man.

This is George Jetson your best friend in the whole wide world! We work at Spacely Space Cybergenetics Corporation. I started to tell George Jetson that I wasn’t feeling good and to tell the boss Mr. Cosmos Spacely that I wasn’t going to make it to work today. But just like curiosity killed the cat. I found myself traversing on a moving walkway towards his flying car at the sky pad.

When I entered the flying car the first thing he said to me was. Afolabi Ballo, you know you can’t never not show up during the one long hour and 3 days out of the week we work. Beings you’re the only black person living in Orbit City. Come to think about it I never seen one black person while watching the Jetsons in black and white when it first aired in 1962. My favorite cartoon of all times. You know how racist the future is because they learned that, that coronavirus almost wiped out the entire Japanese, Italy, and especially all them  Harlem New York City African American races.

You only here because of each city has to have at least one black person living in there city who signed a contract that they won’t ever allow any of us to get Jungle Fever. I’m thinking to myself ain’t Jungle Fever a severe variety of malarial fever occurring in the East Indies and the tropics. Then it dawned on me that George was referring to the slang term used to describe white people in interracial relationships. That term was originally used to describe relationship between a white woman and a black man, the term later included relationship between white man and black woman, nowadays, any white individual in an interracial relationship has Jungle Fever.

Wait a minute I thought. Could characters from a cartoon really get Jungle Fever? I watched that ridiculous cartoon Black Sambo and Stymie of the Little Rascal or was that Buck Wheat and don’t even think Darla Jean Hood was ever interested in either one of them.

I had a thousand and one questions I wanted to ask him. All the while he kept complaining that his wife Jane in which they just celebrated their 98^th anniversary doesn’t find him sexually attractive anymore, his daughter Judy hasn’t aged since she was 16 years old who attended Orbit High School forever and he just found out that his son Elroy has been gay since he was 9 years old. His Robotic who rolled around their condo on one wheel maid Rosie quit all because of those meddlesome Labor Union Robot Officials. We do turn her off at 8 pm every night and we don’t turn her back on until 5am. To make matters worse he says that his dog Astro is demanding that he pay for him to take speech therapy sessions. What a world we live in he sighs Afolabi.

I say to myself I know for sure that someone at that poker table spiked my drink.

When we get to the plant that looked as if it was sitting or built on a cloud. George suddenly, disappears. The magic carpet I’m standing on leads me to the area in which I work. There are thousands of big cyber hydro sleep chambers as far as I can see. I look inside of one of them and it’s no other than that gorgeous frozen Halle Berry nude.

I unhappily awake to find myself in my own bed. I had fallen to sleep while watching the Jetsons cartoon on my DVR.