If you're one of the twillions tweaked by Twitter-mania in general, and the twoubling twend of adding a "tw" to the beginning of every noun, verb, adjective and adverb, you may have reason to rejoice: A geek version of Nostradomus (Tweetstradomus?) is predicting a major Y2K-like event in the Twittersphere, sometime tomorrow.

Technically, the site www.twitpocalypse.com says 1:30:21 p.m. Greenwich Mean Time, but I haven't the motivation to do the Google search to find out what that is in Tucson time. Apparently, the unique numeric identifier for each "tweet" is fast approaching the magic number of 2,147,483,647, which is the geek equivalent of 666. At that moment, the identifiers will become negative numbers, crashing some or many of the third-party software programs dorks like me use to manage our Twitter accounts.

There's even a cool count-up meter of tweet numbers on the Twitpocalypse site, so you can watch the imminent demise of civilization in real time.

There is late word from the Web site Mashable.com that Twitter engineers went ahead and moved up the end of civilization (by skipping some numbers) to right now, so that third-party developers can reboot the world as we know it and still have Sunday to rest (the way the former creator intended it).

If this is the end of the Tweetosphere, Twitterverse, or Twitter-whatever-we're-calling it, enjoy the prescient videos below from Current TV (and they say Al Gore didn't invent the Internet):

If not, feel free to leave your Twitter twexpletives in the comments. I'll even provide a handy link to words that start with "tw" to help you.

I guess they forgot that our entry into fascism was confirmed once habeas corpus disappeared. What are they complaining about now?

We dis politicians cuz they be biters and we be tools. But why be hatin'? They just need help keepin' it real. You down? So I be flossin' a grip with this mad crunk, hella dope and off the hook chart. Aiight? Peace out.

Somewhere beyond a wall of health alerts and travel warnings, there is still a Rocky Point.

Our Rocky Point.

It seems pretentious to call Puerto Peñasco by its given name: The dusty little seaside escape for Arizonans was long ago gringo-ized, our closest refuge to quench a summer's thirst for water and dip a toe in the ocean.

We need Rocky Point. And it needs us.

Nowhere was this more evident than when my two brothers and I rolled into town last Thursday evening to load up on carne asada, pollo, carnitas and queso tacos from our favorite street stand on the way to the luxuries of a condo on Sandy Beach.

Services for Tess Martinez will be held at St Melany's Byzantine Catholic Church, 1212 N. Sahuara Ave. A rosary will take place on Monday, June 8, at 7 p.m.; the funeral services will be held at 10 a.m., Tuesday, June 9.

The family is also collecting donations for Tess' services. Donations can be made at the Bank of Tucson (4400 E. Broadway Blvd.), account no. 4038626; at Something Sweet Dessert Lounge (5319 E. Speedway Blvd., 881-7735) or at St. Melany's.

UA astronomer Chris Impey, who says he's traveled over 5 million miles by air, shared his perspective on the recent Air France tragedy in an opinion piece published in the Los Angeles Times.

Here's the weekly bulletin from Sandy Bahr, lobbyist for the Grand Canyon chapter of the Sierra Club. Among her concerns: The GOP budget plan eliminates impact fees for three years and limits them thereafter.

Hi all! I am putting this out on Thursday night as tomorrow I am off to talk about electricity transmission for the day. It was an “interesting” week at the Capitol, but not much good came of it. After passing a horrendous budget this week, the Senate will move on to hearing a plethora of bad bills next week. Already President Burns has assigned more than 200 bills to committees. I do believe our state would be better off without most of them.

The House passed the same terrible budget. They have been hearing and voting out bills all along, but I expect will move more to the Senate now that they have sent a budget up to the Governor. Speaking of the Governor, please contact her and ask her to veto the budget bills. Call her at (602) 542-4331 or toll free at 1-(800) 253-0883. You can email here by clicking here and then filling in the online form. Please contact her as soon as possible.

She should veto the budget for the following reasons, among many:

SB1035 contains a moratorium on development impact fees that prohibits imposition of any impact fees from July 1, 2009 through June 30, 2012. It also contains language that that makes it more difficult for

Republicans cobbled together enough votes to pass a budget this week, but they're sitting on it rather than transmitting it to Gov. Jan Brewer, who isn't happy with the spending plan.

We're still unpacking the GOP budget, but it contains deep cuts, lots of debt and bad policy. We'll share tidbits in the days ahead.

So what's next? Republicans—who are already short-tempered since learning that Brewer was planning to run public-relations campaigns in their districts to support her version of the budget—are negotiating with the governor, but they don't want any part of one of her key proposals: a temporary hike in the sales tax.

Here's something they may offer her: A commission with the power to refer a tax increase to the voters. That way, lawmakers are one more step away from raising taxes. At the same time, Brewer gets to put together whatever kind of tax reform she wants, without interference from lawmakers on either side of the aisle, as long as she can control the makeup of the commission.

So the GOP budget, with Brewer's changes, would become law, and then Brewer could offer up an alternative for voters to approve in November if they are unhappy with the results.

Keep in mind: We all saw how well asking voters for more money worked in California ...

I, too, am fed up with Rio Nuevo! Except, I don't know what it is.

So much about this chimera remains unknown to mortal citizens. Its beginnings are cloudy; its workings are mysterious; its mission is perplexing; its fate is indeterminate. Its habits - what it eats, how it mates - are complete enigmas. No one even knows if the beast is growing or shrinking. In fact, the only two things that we know for sure about Rio Nuevo are paradoxical: it is not "new," and it is not a "river."

Seeking understanding, I went online. I found tax documents with figures down to the cent. I found organizations being reorganized in order to organize other organizations. There were feasibility studies, impact studies, and assessments. There were meetings, messages, agendas, signatures, acronyms and a long list of board members, or were they "bored" members? I was still confused.

The official Rio Nuevo website offered the comforting (if banal) slogan, "Downtown Tucson, The Heart of the City." It was written in an Old Spanish font, as if the letters were scratched into a heavy wooden door, as if someone were trying to get in...or out! Danger aside, I knew I had to put boots on the ground, and see Rio Nuevo face-to-face. Armed with bottled water, a mustache and sunglasses - much like Cortez - I decided to explore the Land of Three Tall Buildings in search of the elusive Rio Nuevo.

My descent was from the northeast through an area that used to be a great learning center. Tall crane-like objects - possibly cranes - loomed alongside the Three Tall Buildings. As I got closer to Rio Nuevo, I realized the feral creature had marked its territory with construction horses, sand bags, caution ribbon and chain link. A sign read Keep Left; another read Keep Right. If this was the "heart" of the city, then it was getting quadruple bypass surgery.

To truly understand the entirety of Rio Nuevo is not possible. It would be like the fabled blind men examining the elephant. In one place Rio Nuevo felt like a tree trunk; in another it felt like a crater; in another like an elephant. In one place it was an old wall rebuilt; elsewhere it was a new wall torn down. I was still confused.

I looked very closely, but could find no delineating edge to Rio Nuevo. The square-yard of urban detritus before me held dirt, macadam, metal, glass and plastic. But, where did Rio Nuevo start, and regular downtown end? At the tire tracks in the dirt? At this pothole? At that one? Was it the line of the construction ribbon, blowing about? Rio Nuevo was like two hands not clapping in the wind.

My scientific theory was falling apart; I grew uneasy. Suddenly, Rio Nuevo seemed omnipresent. I sensed it lurking in the shadows of the Land of Three Tall Buildings. The leviathan was everywhere and nowhere! I could feel it's gaze, as if it were stalking me! And, I ran...

I ran past a scattered jumble of Rio Nuevo parts near the Eastern Corridor when a giant rattlesnake bridge appeared! It was large enough to swallow a human! I searched for poor souls inside its perforated metal skin, but there were no pedestrians anywhere! None! Where were the people? Good God, where were the people?!

One day, the Land of Three Tall Buildings will be covered with sand up to the very tops of the Three Tall Buildings. Our descendants will dig and find Rio Nuevo, or what's left of it: mummified building supplies, exotic construction horses with orange flashing eyes, and two recurring words in an Old Spanish font suggesting a "new river." They will house these artifacts in a future Museum built with public bond money, and they will charge $100 at the door. Thusly, will Rio Nuevo finally come to fruition.

From the brilliant minds at The Onion:

Conservatives Warn Quick Sex Change Only Barrier Between Gays, Marriage