By Raoul Thibodeaux, Avant News Staff Writer -- New York City, February 21, 2038 -- As the bell rang to close the trading session today at the New York Stock Exchange, board members of Global Earth World Planet International (GEWPI) celebrated with toasts of sparkling wine at an undisclosed location. They had reason to celebrate as their privately held consortium had just completed a two-week buying spree of all outstanding shares in every publicly traded company across the world.

Philadelphia, June 23, 2146 -- After 42 seconds of intense negotiation, the Philadelphia Eagles signed their top pick in the 2146 NFL draft, bakbakBNAK!! schHneeeeBORTTT, the mercurial wideout from a remote planetoid in the whooooooOOOOOGoMMMM!!! Galaxy and Georgia Tech, to a five-year, $574 million contract.

"We're excited that bakbakBNAK!! schHneeeeBORTTT is on board," says Eagles coach Lou Pendergast. "We're gonna throw downfield more this season, and we think bakbakBNAK!! schHneeeeBORTTT will contribute right away. The kid's got tentacles."

Oak Brook, Illinois, April 12, 2096 -- McDonald's restaurants, responding to customer demand for healthier and more varied cuisine, have announced a new assortment of culinary selections, the McCockroach Collection.

New McDonald's McCockroach Big Bug Bite

The McCockroach will be test-launched at select franchises in three major metropolitan areas over the next five weeks, to be followed by a nationwide rollout heralded by an unprecedented 12-media crossover advertising campaign.

Washington, D.C., March 12, 2006 -- Vice President Dick Cheney, a leading advocate of the use of torture in the so-called "war on terror", successfully demonstrated the effectiveness of the technique this month by allowing himself to personally undergo a one-week program of "coerced interrogation", the compassionately conservative term for the practice. During the week, the Vice President proved the value of torture by unwillingly confessing to a wide range of infractions, some of them quite surprising.