@chet - have you read into the theory of the pole reversal meant to happen in 2012?
people claiming its all doom and gloom end of the world stuff, what the mayans suggested was that we would be entering a new age, the end of one into another, not the end of mankind.
spookily, as you say, the intensity of natural disasters is at it incredibly high rate and climbing in the build to the pencilled 2012 date.
Likely a coincidence, but makes you wonder if the pole reversal thing is plausible.
Jenson drives it like he owns it; Lewis drives it like he stole it