After countless moves and whittlings-down of belongings, I’ve somehow managed to save this Seattle Y2K readiness flyer for posterity.

The frenetically-designed Y2K logo and then-mayor Paul Schell’s letter attempt to convey confidence in the face of what was then a frightening question: will bugs in our computers inadvertantly trigger an apocalypse scenario?

But read on, and you’ll find caution and caveats: best to keep enough non-perishable food on hand for 3-7 days, for example.

We really didn’t know what would happen at the time — it was unsettling. My childhood friend and I opted to escape the city that New Year’s Eve, figuring rural was safer than urban. We headed up to northwest Washington state, where we grew up. 

But it was anticlimactic — nothing catastrophic happened, and all was well. (Until the following year.)