I just thought this was funny when it popped into my head this morning. Funny because I should have thought of it long ago and I'm sure that I'm not the first to think this. The big point comes after my little spiel.
So, God tells Noah to build an ark because he has a lot of killing of the wicked to do and only Noah and his family seem to be good enough. If he can get other people on board great (was there room made for other people?). Anyway, Noah and his 3 sons build this megaship, they get all the animals on the ship (presumably even the ones that don't live on his continent and so on) then the rain starts to fall, the family gets on board and God finally lifts a finger to help and shuts the door. The Great Flood (First Armageddon) happens, the world is cleansed of the wicked, the waters recede, they get off the ark and all of the animals are released (but why don't some of those species of animals exist on that continent now?) They were vegetarians but now that there isn't any plant-life (except for the bush that the ram is stuck in and the tree that the dove lands on...) so now they're meat eaters but there's only two of each animal so how will they do that, especially with nothing to feed them? hmmm Time goes on, Noah plants a vineyard and loves to drink in excess.
SO my point is this, even if you can believe that Noah lived for 950 years as we calculate them today, it all happened in HIS lifetime. From being warned all the way to after the flood. But now we are expected to wait generation after generation (or is it just one big, continued generation now) a couple of Noah's lifetimes anyway. Why so long?