What year is now the Future?

I'm still waiting for the year 2000 from my 70s/80s childhood. The one with floating cities, O'Neill space stations, flying cars and jet packs. Not the one where we are all eating dog food and fighting for gas, though I wouldn't mind the Max's Interceptor. I feel like we are in 1999v9 instead of 2008.

I remember a book I read in 5th grade or so that had awesome artwork and visions of the future. I've occasionally tried to find it but have had no luck as I just remember bits and pieces of pictures and not the title or author. I want it for nostalgia and for the artwork/inspiration as I get a kick out of the "World of the Future" things from old World's Fairs.

Recently I picked up Mudhoney's 'Under A Billion Suns' CD (Never picked up there last 2 albums for whatever reason even though I have all their older stuff). While I've been having this year 2000 thought long before I heard it, their song 'Where Is The Future' sums it up nicely:

I was born on an Air Force Base
Nineteen sixty two
A rocket launch into outer space
Knocked me out of the womb
I cried and cried and cried
Happy to be alive
Astronauts were orbiting Earth
The Space Age was in sight

Where is the future that was promised us
Where is the future for everyone
Where is the future that was promised us
Where is our future of fun
Where is the future that was promised us
I'm sick to death of this one

I want to live in a floating city
I want to drive a bubble car
I want to fly with my personal jet pack
I want to visit my family on Mars
I want to live in an era of peace,
Of Love and Justice, Wonder and Truth
I want a world run by giant brains
Instead of small-minded arrogant fools

I need to go and watch Mad Max/Road Warrior or A Boy and His Dog to balance out my utopian dreaming with a good post-apocalyptic dystopia.

Fifi: They say people don't believe in heroes anymore. Well damn them! You and me, Max, we're gonna give them back their heroes!
Max: Ah, Fif. Do you really expect me to go for that crap?
Fifi: You gotta admit I sounded good there for a minute, huh?

Born from this space nostalgia was my most recent drawing, which is a tribute to Voyager 1 in my surreal style:


(Goes back to enjoying the fruits of current tech by listening to some Nebula MP3s while surfing the net)

EDIT 2/1/08: Just saw that 1/31/2008 was the 50th anniversary of the launch of the first Earth satellite of the US (Explorer 1). This sat discovered the Van Allen Belts.

Edit 2/6/08: Thanks to a Wired blog I found the book I've been thinking of - 'The Usborne Book of the Future' published in 1979. Some quick google-fu finds me many of the pics I was thinking of and others like me that enjoyed the book. Also found a blog focused on the past's concepts of the future - Paleo-Future.

Brave Captain

"Captain, there are doubts
regarding
your ability
to lead them
the men
lead them
there are doubts in your ability
there's too many blanks in your analogies"

fIREHOSE - Brave Captain video

Haven't listened to fIREHOSE in a while as I don't have the CD and haven't reached for the tape in years. Though I have been listening to the Minutemen as I have Double Nickels on CD. Resigned up for eMusic to get Sasquatch and the latest Red Giant CDs and saw both fIREHOSE and Minutemen stuff is now on there.

I remember seeing this video when I was a young skaterpunk of only 13 years (Think it was on 120 Minutes). I still listen to a lot of the stuff I was into then (Dead Kennedys (w/ Jello Only!), Black Flag, etc.) and still consider NoMeansNo my favorite band even after all these years. For some strange reason, this song and the Ragin' Full On album hit me more than any music has in a while (Probably due to not hearing it in forever unlike my almost daily doses of NMN). Basically compressed the last 21 years of my life into one song where I was reminded of everything even though I wasn't hanging onto a specific thought. And yet it still had a nice groove...or maybe it was just the corndogs.

Now I just have to wait until my downloads refill next month so I can nab me some Post-Mersh Minutemen.