So I got on the horn and called the one person I knew could explain these troubling events: George Culley.

            George is Pinckneyville’s fire and brimstone go-to guy. He is also running for mayor. He and I go way back to days in the mid-1990s when I edited the defunct Pinckneyville Democrat and as editorial page editor of the Southern Illinoisan a few years later.

            George was a habitual letter writer and most of his missives tied current events with end of the world theories. We were so familiar with each other he’d call me “Brother Jeff,” although I don’t remember him at our supper table growing up.

            So I called him and when he picked up I hadn’t finished my question and he was out of the gate with answer about the birds that died in the sky.

            While he hadn’t decided on a definitive reason why they dropped dead in mid-flight, he had boiled it down to four possibilities. The first two were of the Oliver Stone, governmental conspiracy types.

In one, he theorized, that the Russians (or the Chinese) had sprayed some kind of biological toxin into the jet stream that then floated across the Pacific Ocean and most of the Western United States for the purpose of targeting 2,000 birds over Arkansas. The second was that this top secret “bird-icide” was executed by our own government for unexplained reasons.

These seemed a little “out there” for me and they certainly didn’t contain the Biblical references I was seeking. I asked George if he had any other explanations.

            He continued on that those darn Russians were injecting some bad stuff into the BP oil well that exploded in the Gulf of Mexico last summer and those gases were leeching out of the earth in Arkansas. He gets an A for effort for this one but, still, where the heck is the eternal damnation angle?

            With one more cause to go George hit his stride. He again said that gas killed the birds but that it came out of the New Madrid fault as part of God’s judgment. Now we’re talking! It thanked George for his perspective and hung up.

            Let me pause to say that while it might seem that I am mocking George; his theories are no more outrageous than others that have been espoused. Our brightest scientists haven’t come to any consensus so his views are as valid any.

            This is a perfect time to dwell on the unexplainable. The calendar is counting down to the year 2012 when the Mayans, a civilization that vanished thousands of years ago, predicts that ours will meet a similar fate.

            The Mayans weren’t the kind of people whom you’d invite to a party. Aside from creating a cool looking calendar, they were into human sacrifices and walking around their temples wearing “The End is Near” sandwich boards. They don’t seem like they let down their hair much.

            But somehow, they have convinced a lot of modern day people that they are true prognosticators. These believers are likely the same folks who thought Haley’s Comet in 1919, or the Harmonic Conversion of 1987 or the Y2K Bug of 2000 were going to end humankind.  It seems that anything that calls for our demise takes on a following.

            Now, as 2012 approaches we are being told to gear up for another doomsday. If you don’t believe me than tune in the History Channel because its programming is filled with previews of when the world ends.

            Could it be that we as a society have become so bored that we need conspiracies and doomsday predictions just to keep our lives interesting? They seem to be everywhere and some are more local than global.

            Take the airlifting of rattlesnakes conspiracy that is being bounced around Southern Illinois. I just heard this one but the person who told me about it swears it’s true. She also believes Elvis is alive.

            The story goes the Illinois Dept. of Natural Resources is dropping rattlesnakes from helicopters onto the grasslands and woodlands of southern Illinois as a means of controlling the region’s wild turkey population. Apparently, these serpents have a taste for turkey eggs, although I always thought those venomous fangs were used to kill small mammals.

            Now rattlesnakes, like Arkansas red-winged blackbirds, can’t fly so how to the critters survive the fall? The conspiracists have an answer to that: biodegradable crates.

Since no one has ever found one of these boxes they must burn up instantly like those cassette tapes used on the old “Mission Impossible” show.

            There is something about IDNR and conspiracies that goes hand-in-hand. First the agency was secretly introducing panthers, then black bears, then elk. Now they are carpet bombing us with poisonous snakes (even though these creates are already indigenous to these parts and have never gone away).

            Maybe it is a trait of mistrust we inherited from our Puritan ancestors. IDNR people lurk in the woods all day where witches and demons roamed in Puritan times, so they themselves must be evil. The symbol of the serpent itself is considered demonic.

            I did a little research on the snake drop theory and, not surprisingly, discovered it is not isolated to southern Illinois. It has been reported in Virginia, Arkansas and Missouri, as well. Damn those copycats. Can’t we have our own conspiracy without others horning in?

            Not if it’s a juicy one. Whether it’s doomsday, suicidal birds or government snake plots, if it creates fear or doubt it is going to catch on.

            I want to create my own conspiracy theory or doomsday prediction but I need your help. Submit an idea below. I will take the best one and start promoting it.