It was a good way of keeping the future in the future, but why keep the future away in the first place?
Star Trek used stardates to keep the events of the shows un-specific as to when they happen. But as time progressed, the desire to have exact dates grew. Stardates and our calendar were incompatible with each other by design, but the timelines still intertwined. How long ago was that modern-day event the captain is referring to? Eventually, they created an official chronology with the help of enough research to make a geek start an anti-matter explosion in their brain.

It is time that the Kenny Chronicles universe got some definite years, too.

In April, I’ll do ONE MORE advance of the “__ years in the future”(it’s tradition), then in 2012 I’ll start using absolute years rather than relative years. Before, the year was relative to whenever you’re reading it. This can be confusing, and I wouldn’t feel right having this rule apply if somebody is reading the comic 100 years in the future, when they already have more advanced stuff than I predicted. Probably the biggest reason for pushing the future further and further back is because the timeline indicates that the first Tarneki was created…. NOW! But it’s fiction, after all. Why not have the genetic experiments going on right now? Like Star Trek, I’m starting to reference events that happen between now and comic-time. If I reference something we KNOW will happen between now & then, I want today’s future and the comic’s past to line up. Astronomical activity is just one category of events that we know when certain things will happen in the future. Certain technological advances are near-certain, as well. With only 118 years in between, there will be a LOT of intertwining of timelines.

This coincidentally makes Kenny’s birth year the same as Captain Jonathan Archer’s(2111 AD). For you non-Trekkies, he’s the captain of the Enterprise in the most recent show, Star Trek: Enterprise. That show is set long before Captain Kirk and Mr. Spock.
With this in mind, certain parts of Star Trek’s history can be assumed. By the time Kenny is born, faster-than-light travel will be possible(not sure I’ll call it warp drive), and there will have been a third world war. They have not found any aliens yet, however, unlike in the Star Trek universe(well, the aliens found the humans). Humans will of course have bases on Mars way before Kenny was born. Star Trek says the first manned mission to Mars is 2032, and real-life plans aren’t far from that.
I may even figure in stuff predicted by other science fiction stories, and will definitely figure in as many real-world scientific predictions as possible, as long as I deem them plausible(sorry, cold-fusion).

So there you have it. Starting in April, the comic will be set in the year 2129. Enjoy 2128 while it lasts :-p