Here's our predictions of how events and non-events of the year might pan out.
JANUARY
* George W. Bush accepts the presidency but misspeaks himself in the oath of office by saying, "I will faithfully disgrace the duties of the office of President to the best of my disability."
FEBRUARY
* In a critically acclaimed performance former United States president Bill Clinton appears on an episode of Sex and the City playing a dignified former president and father of fellow guest star John Travolta. "Shucks, it was only acting dignified," he says. "I've done did that for years.'
* Jeff Wilson returns to rugby saying he is "much refreshed" and appears to have learned three whole new extravagant gestures to celebrate scoring a try. He is given a new nickname: Olden Goldie.
MARCH
* After a mediocre season the Black Caps say they have "more work to do" but will "remain positive."
* A report by a New York futurist think tank BigIdeasNow! declares the use of phrases "e-commerce, e-business" and "e-tail" as "last year's thing." Though that doesn't stop a new company, offering online advice from simple but hardy folk from the Yorkshire dales naming itself, e-bygum.
* George W. Bush misspeaks himself on his first presidential visit to Europe when he attempts to echo John F. Kennedy's famous "Ich bin ein Berliner." President Bush jauntily announces, "Maybe it's because I'm a Londoner." He is in Catholic Belfast at the time.
* After his portrayal of kinky French blue-blood the Mar*uis De Sade in quills, Geoffrey Rush wins his second Oscar and is subsequently voted sexiest man of the year, pipping fellow big-screen Antipodeans Mel Gibson and Russell Crowe.
APRIL
* R&B singer Sisqo attempts to follows up his 2000 hit Thong Song with Bra Ballad. It fails to chart despite a video featuring rapper Eminem in a cross-dressing cameo. Subsequent Sisqo singles Y- Front Yell and Long John Lullaby also tank.
* In a whirlwind five days former US president Bill Clinton is seen in Hollywood with Julia Roberts, in Boston with Barbra Streisand and Florida with a cashier from a Taco Bell in Sarasota.
* A member of the world champion New Zealand women's cricket team and the world champion Black Sox men's softball team are recognised in the street for the first time. It is later explained that they both appeared on quiz show A Question of Sport the night before.
MAY
* On one otherwise delightful autumn morning John Campbell wakes up and declares on National Radio that he has found something he's seen, read or listened to less than marvellous. He doesn't let on what it is for fear of hurting its creator's feelings.
* George W. Bush announces initiatives against poverty. Regrettably, when addressing Congress he mis*uotes the inscription on the Statue of Liberty. He announces, "Send me you muddied hassles ..."
* In what's termed the "toddler telly wars," Japanese animated phenomenon Pokemon, having already given away ground to Digimon, is further usurped by the new hit Jamaican animated series Rastamon. Concerned parents groups' protest about the show's mesmerising effect on their children and its "hypnotic rhythms."
JUNE
* Hollywood announces that as sequels are only projected to make 60 per cent of the money of first instalments, they will be charging 40 per cent more for tickets for such films. The price hike applies to Jurassic Park 3, The Mummy Returns, Stuart Little 2, Dumb and Dumber II: The Early Years, and Crocodile Dundee in Hollywood. But as a concession, ticket prices are halved for remakes because, says a spokesman, "they only require half an idea." The discounts apply to the new versions of Ocean's 11, Planet of the Apes, Josie and the Pussycats, and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.
However, the new pricing structure is thrown into confusion and eventually abandoned after Dr Doolittle 2, which is a sequel to a remake.
* Former US president Bill Clinton appears as a guest host on The Jerry Springer Show. The topic: I never slept with that woman. At the end where Springer usually says, "So, what did we learn here?" Clinton looks flustered.
JULY
* The replanting of One Tree Hill becomes the subject of a bidding war between Maggie's Garden Show, Ground Force and Mucking In. Auckland Mayor Christine Fletcher appears flustered at the uproar.
* The US coastguard is put on red alert after intelligence reports from Cuba suggest young Elian Gonzalez has become an unusually good swimmer.
* Richard Branson purchases the Mir space station. Says he'll think of a use for it later, but that's the "outrageous" sort of guy he is.
AUGUST
* New Zealand police crack another drug-importing ring bigger and more sophisticated than any they have cracked before, and entirely eradicate the trade.
* George W. Bush invites visiting British PM Tony Blair to witness an executionin Texas. Blair declines and Bush responds with a witty shoulder shrug and a boyishly charming, "What?" He surges ahead in opinion polls taken in trailer parks.
* Former US president Bill Clinton is arrested outside Graceland in Memphis drunk and wearing an Elvis mask. His companion is Trixy-Mae, a topless waitress at the nearby Jake's For Steaks. He is later discharged without conviction, the judge noting the former president "seems to be a man with no conviction at all."
* During a test commentary former All Black Murray Mexted uses the words "pernicious, insouciant" and "indecorous" during one extended 20-minute spell of play. He is later awarded an MBE in the New Year's Honours for widening appreciation of the English language. "Well, I'll be rooted," is his initial response to the news.
* The "Bring Back Taine" movement flares briefly, in a pub, somewhere in Dunedin.
SEPTEMBER
* Former US president Bill Clinton appears in public with former first lady Hillary for the first time in six months. They dine at Andy's Crawdad Castle in New York and Clinton announces he has signed a tell-all publishing deal for $US9 million. The book, Low Lifes Having High Times, promises numerous photos from his extensive Polaroid collection and will be serialised in Rolling Stone. Hillary pays for the ribs and cornbread.
* John Hawkesby finally stops laughing all the way to his bank. But he still finds it hard to stop smirking during public appearances, he tells a woman's magazine in an exclusive.
OCTOBER
* Augie Auer's half-hour series Auer's Auguries, which investigates the history of weather forecasting and prediction, is dropped after the second episode when Augie disembowels a live chicken and looks into its entrails to predict theweather for Labour Weekend. (Footnote: his prediction was incorrect. It rained)
* George W. Bush speaks to Congress for a full two minutes before realising he is reading the Gettysburg Address and not his speech on tax reform. "I guess I misspoke Mr Washington," he says with boyish charm. The Gettysburg Address, he is told later, was written by Abraham Lincoln. "What?" is his witty rejoinder.
* After a mid-year petition organised by the South of the Bombay Hills Don't Blame Us Action Group fails to make the New Zealand Warriors revert back to the Auckland Warriors in name, the team ends another NRL season promising that next year, they'll put in the hard yards and do better.
* Guy Ritchie and Madonna issue a press release wondering why, after the whole world wanted to see their wedding, no one goes to their first film together entitled Maddy Get Your Gun.
* Tiger Woods starts putting with one hand tied behind his back — "to make it interesting." Still wins everything.
NOVEMBER
* At the annual New Zealand television awards a new category is created, the John Campbell Award, which goes to newsreaders who do not exploit their private lives on the pages of women's magazine or their charitable work for their own egos. There is only one nominee: John Campbell of TV3.
* At the same awards show, the award for Realest Reality Show (taking the place of best one-off drama) goes to Life of Flatmates Together Again Mucking In on Treasure Island, on Tape.
* The People's Bank opens. The People complain about queues.
* No errors are reported in secondary and tertiary exam papers. Not one.
* With the advent of digital television, PlayStation 2 and Microsoft's X-Box among other gadgets, it is noted that some New Zealand homes have more black boxes in their lounges than most Third World airlines have in their planes. Meanwhile a PS2 owner in Mt Albert is heard to say: "Wow, with this new game I've just bought it really was worth spending a thousand bucks on PlayStation 2." The price halves in the run-up to Christmas.
* It's taken most of the year but Leader of the Opposition Jenny Shipley finally scores a point off Prime Minister Helen Clark.
DECEMBER
* Just in time for the Christmas market, Paul launches his Holmes Video series, a 10-part chronological collection of home footage tracing his life from childhood to present day. Includes film of him with his lovely children and with lovely old people. The DVD version comes with outtakes of his childhood and extensive interviews where he discusses his Holmes autobiography and Holmes album. The sweeping orchestral soundtrack, Holmes with Strings Attached, which he wrote himself, is made available on CD, cassette and limited edition vinyl.
* Helen Clark ends the year at the centre of a major political scandal after she is photographed secretly having a good time under taxpayer-funded Christmas lights.
* Across the world, avid Lord of the Rings fans stage sit-ins at cinemas demanding only those who have read the book should be allowed to see it first. The protests are marred by running street battles with Harry Potter fans and Star Wars followers.
* Former US president Bill Clinton ends the year on a high note: he negotiates a Middle East peace settlement, becomes the media spokesman for Coca-Cola, and after an amicable divorce from Hillary, settles down as a country lawyer in Ziplock, Tennessee with a 23-year-old shop assistant from Mobile, Alabama. "My wild days are over," he says with a wink.
Future Perfect: What's going to happen in 2001
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