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For all we know, this pictured above guy with a huge "guarantees it" bumper sticker was cajoled by his parents into affixing it on his backpack as he trudged off to college classes. Probably not. But there are plenty of other Harold Camping followers that have stories to tell about their good-hearted, but naturally frenzied, parents.
In this morning's New York Times, with the appropriately Times-y title "Make My Bed? But You Say the World's Ending," we follow the final-remaining days (as they think) of Abby and Robert Carson, two normal, well-adjusted parents who love their kids and family deeply but also happen to believe that the world will be brutally torn apart at its seams tomorrow (well, actually later tonight). They have quit their jobs, stopped saving for college, joined mission trips to "sound the trumpet" and...failed to convince their kids that there's an apocalypse now.
"My mom has told me directly that I’m not going to get into heaven," said their daughter Grace to the Times. "At first it was really upsetting, but it’s what she honestly believes." Their 14 year-old son Robert, was more blunt: "People look at my family and think I’m like that...I keep my friends as far away from them as possible." Ah, teen angst these days: Mom, could you wait on selling the house until AFTER 6 p.m. on Saturday, please?