Time travel is always a difficult proposition. Go forward, and you run the risk of getting unexpected cyborg implants. Go backward, and it’s the plague. Even a trip to a few years ago could be difficult without preparation, especially if you didn’t prepare for issues of vintage money and trade. All in all, it’s best to simply avoid the situation entirely, as most of us do.
By choice. Yes, conscious choice… Still, it’s fun to image what one might do with one’s very own TARDIS, leading to today’s astro-temporal query…
The MS-QOTD (pronounced, as always, “misquoted”) would probably invest in vintage dimes and head for a newsstand circa 1938-1944, asking: Given your own time travel device, where is the safest place to go first?
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Something really petty that will pretty much only improve something very minor. So I’m up for paying my phone bill on-time last month.
On the other hand, there’s a pretty big risk of crossing my own time-line if I do that.
The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy stated that the biggest problem for prospective time-travelers is/was/will be language. In honor of this problem, I would probably do whatever would be in my power to keep stupid words from entering the dictionaries of the world. Looking at you, “bouncebackability”
If I’m trying to avoid bumping into myself and creating a paradox, I could safely stroll around almost the entire year of 1984 with no issue because that is when I spent almost a year in the hospital when I was diagnosed with cancer (there were other complications that made the stay longer than it should have been). But at least that would be a prime year to invest in certain toys (plenty of franchises like Transformers, G.I. Joe and the tail end of classic Star Wars figure lines). They may not fetch as much as, say, Action Comics #1 or Amazing Fantasy #15, but still would be worth the investment.
Then again, I could just avoid my lifetime entirely and go back to before 1979 and record the “Lost Episodes” of Doctor Who.
I have to admit that it would be very hard to resist temptation to go and see next weeks lottery numbers and not worry about money for the rest of my life.
I’d go back to last Thursday so I could pay my phone bill on time :)