Monthly Archives: August 2012

It’s a brand new me

I try to be a nice guy. In theory, in my head, in my image of myself, whenever I think about me, about my self-image, about Rob G. the guy, the human being, about what type of guy I am, I think, who am I? Who do I want to be? I think about being a nice person, understanding, compassionate, empathetic. I like to give out advice to people. Whenever somebody I know is angry or upset or not smiling, I like to dole out platitudes, like, “Hey man, don’t sweat the small stuff,” or, “You know, if you just force yourself to smile, eventually your brain will start firing off dopamine, so just fake it until you feel it.” And I’ll think that I really mean this stuff, and maybe at that moment I’ll actually believe it myself. Maybe I can really convince myself, fool myself for a whole day, a week even. I’ll concentrate on taking really deep breaths and catching myself before I get locked in a bad mood. And then maybe I’ll actually start to believe this for longer than a week, like maybe it’ll be a month, and I’m walking around smiling, great posture, I’m just this shining, living example of positivity. And I’m running all the time. And I’m eating great. And I haven’t fought with anybody in so long. I’m just past all of the negativity. This is a brand new me. And I’m thinking all about me, about how it’s so much better to just feel great all of the time, to just stay positive, above all of the petty, biological reactions to normal, pedestrian, everyday problems, above everyone else and their funny looks and their insults. I’ve reached a new level of spiritual maturity. I get things now. I’ve been feeling so great for so long now. Words keep popping in my mind like transcendence and evolution and growth. You know what? I’m in such a great mood. Let’s go to McDonald’s.

And then I walk over to McDonald’s, and I’m smiling. And I’m just standing tall, beaming. Radiating. I’m just radiating my chest out in front of me, taking these giant long breaths. Me and this other guy are walking towards the door at the same time, and I want to be the bigger person and hold the door open for him, to set a good, positive example, but I don’t want to run, because I don’t want him to think that I’m racing him towards the door so I can get on line first. This guy’s probably not as emotionally secure as I am, he might take my running to be just that, running, a race, while I’m actually just trying to be polite, to him, so I don’t run, I slow my pace actually, letting him go first. I’m in no rush. I’m just enjoying this lovely, beautiful day. Truly a blessing, each day. Each day, a gift. He gets to the door first and he holds it open for me. Unbelievable. I can only assume that my standing up so straight, my calm, relaxed, positive demeanor has somehow inspired this fellow human being to do me a good turn. I’m really appreciative. I’m also a little taken aback. I was counting on me being the one getting thanked, but I thank him nonetheless. I’m humble, if anything. It takes a big man to accept a gift, open-minded, and look, there’s a second door. And I went in first, so now I can return the favor. And now look who’s going to be on line first. That guy is. You’re welcome sir, think nothing of it.

But this is just taking so long. I’m not in a rush or anything, but I mean, it’s McDonald’s. How long should this really be taking? And this line setup. I never understood the McDonald’s line setup. Like there are four cashiers, and each one has their own line. So if you get in the wrong line, like the slowest line, then people at faster lines who may have entered the restaurant after you might actually be getting served first. Wouldn’t it make more sense to have one line, and as a cashier becomes available, the next person waiting in the single line would then move up to get helped? Like at Chipotle. But Chipotle is really more of an assembly line, whereas McDonald’s is all behind-the-scenes type …

And there it is. I might have fooled myself for a day, a week, but here I am on line at McDonald’s just going crazy here. Take a deep breath. It’s OK. I’m back. That was just a hiccup. That wasn’t the new me. That was the old me, but just for a second, so it doesn’t count. But that guy over there definitely came in after me and now he’s ordering. I knew it. I’m totally on the slow line. I always wind up on the slow line. It’s not the line that bothers me, it’s the inconsistency. Who is setting line policy here? Would it kill somebody behind the counter to just pay attention to who is coming in and out? And I just hate it when people cut the line and go right to the counter and start demanding, “Honey mustard! Ketchup! Free refills!” and they think that just because they already paid and are eating that they are somehow entitled to just skip right back to the front. And the cashier always stops whatever he or she is doing to get them condiments and drinks and …

This isn’t working. It’s really not. I know I’m the bigger person, I just know it, but it’s so hard to be mature and composed here when I clearly ordered a Sausage McMuffin meal and this guy just gives me the sandwich and no hashbrown. And I try, politely, calmly, to tell him that I ordered a meal, but he says I didn’t. OK, whatever, I did, but that’s beside the point, just get me a hashbrown because even if you didn’t hear me, I’m telling you right now that I wanted one so just go take my money, please, I feel like I’ve been waiting on line here for a week. And then I get home and there’s no egg, just a sausage patty, and I’m just so pissed, because I rarely get McDonald’s breakfast, I’m never up in time, and I finally find myself all calm and centered and waking up like a normal person and I just want a normal McDonald’s breakfast and I can’t even get a Sausage McMuffin with egg and. And this isn’t working out. I was a bigger person for like a second, but now I’m feeling smaller than ever. Tall, but small. And starving.

We all scream for all-you-can-eat ice cream

This friend of mine used to work in an ice cream store. The pay sucked and there were no benefits but he loved working there because he was allowed to eat as much ice cream as he wanted. New hires always thought this was a pretty cool rule at first, and for a while they would always come into work and just keep eating ice cream, nonstop, no limits, right? I always thought it would make more sense from a corporate perspective to have maybe a “one cup per day” policy, but my friend told me that he thought management had an ulterior motive, that they highlighted the unlimited aspect of the ice cream policy to encourage new hires to overeat. By that logic, they’d keep it up for a day or two, maybe three, but no more than three, because the debilitating stomach ache that comes with too much ice cream is an inevitability, and most likely the new hire would get physically sick sometime during his or her first week. After that, going by the “once you throw it up, you don’t like it any more” rule, they wouldn’t have to worry about employees eating all of the merchandise. “One cup per day” might not ever elicit such a physical reaction. Or, at the very least, it would take a lot longer for the employee to get tired of eating ice cream at the much slower pace of one cup per day. Maybe this plan might even backfire, by restraining the employee’s natural ice cream consumption, it would force them to truly savor each cup, noticing the subtle changes in flavor and texture with each bite. Maybe they would grow to love ice cream even more than they had before. After a while their ice cream immunity would grow, less likely to cause a stomachache, or an ice cream headache. Eventually one cup wouldn’t satisfy the hunger, and they’d start sneaking little spoonfuls, right out of the container when the management wasn’t looking. If they ever got caught, they could just say that they were handing out a free sample to a customer, or, in the event that there aren’t any customers in the store, they could claim that there was some cross contamination, a little piece of cookies-n-cream in the mint chip, and that they were just cleaning it up. It would be really hard to catch employees in the act of eating extra ice cream and, what if management does catch them, what are they going to do, fire somebody over a couple of extra bites of ice cream? It would be an unfortunate situation, nobody really wanting to take any action, all while profits slide and the ice cream store sinks into mismanagement and lost revenue.

So all-you-can-eat ice cream was the rule, and it worked, mostly. Most people got sick after a couple of days. But my friend wasn’t most people. This guy, given ideal circumstances, could probably eat ice cream, one bite after another, without pause, for the rest of his life. Obviously there would have to be some sort of a system involved for bathroom breaks, but I’m not trying to get into the logistics of a challenge, I’m really just trying to drive home the point that this guy can eat a lot of ice cream. And he loved it. He never got tired of it. People would stare at him with these looks of disgust as he polished off his third banana split in less than an hour. They’d say stuff like, “What’s wrong with you?” And he’d say, “What are you talking about?” And they’d ask, “How can you eat so much ice cream? Doesn’t your stomach hurt? Don’t you have a terrible taste in the sides of your mouth? Aren’t you incredibly thirsty? How are you so thin?” And he would just wipe his mouth and say something like, “It’s ice cream! All-you-can-eat ice cream! Who doesn’t love ice cream?” And you could tell that he wasn’t just saying it. Everything about him, the tone of his voice, the earnest expression on his face, you could tell he really meant it, that he really, truly loved eating ice cream.

But the years passed and finally there came a day when my friend took stock of his life and decided that he needed to be doing something else. He hadn’t lost his taste for ice cream, not by any stretch of the imagination, but he felt that maybe it was holding him back, maybe he needed to get out there and see if there wasn’t more to life than free ice cream. So he gave his two-week’s notice. Management was more than happy to see him go. He was a good enough worker, always showing up on time, rarely calling out sick. They could never really say anything to him about his ice cream eating, because it was all perfectly in line with corporate policy. But he was clearly putting a dent into every monthly projection. After a couple of business cycles, accounting had to start actually accounting for his regularly negative impact on inventory.

All of his coworkers told him that on his last day, they should all go out to a bar and celebrate, have a couple of drinks, and then have a couple of shots. They planned on taking him out and getting everybody nice and wrecked. But they warned my friend, they said, “We know you think you have a pretty tough stomach, but seriously, don’t eat any ice cream before we all go out to the bar. It’ll be a terrible mistake.” And my friend wasn’t a huge drinker, but he understood what they were talking about, and he figured he could go a day without ice cream. The day before his last day, he totally cut loose, eating tons and tons of ice cream. But it wasn’t really cutting loose, because he did that everyday anyway, and so even though he tried to eat to his upward limit, he just couldn’t find it, and so it wound up being just like any other work day. But on his last day, for the first time in his career at the ice cream store, he didn’t eat so much as a bite of ice cream. The day was torture. He was sweating, shaking. Now he was tasting that terrible taste in the sides of his mouth. Somehow he got through the day, but it was the worst day of his life, conscious of every painful second. More than a couple of times he looked at his watch, positive that it had to be time to leave, only to find that quitting time was hours away.

After the last customer left, he wiped down the freezers one last time and punched out. He walked across the street to the bar where everybody told him they’d be waiting. When he went inside, it was almost totally empty. He sat down and ordered a beer. He sent a text to one of the coworkers, asking where everybody was. He got a text back, “Hey man, I’m actually pretty beat. Let’s reschedule.” And over the course of the next hour or so, every other coworker got in touch with him. Everybody was tired. Nobody felt like going out any more.

My friend didn’t get upset. He wasn’t one to take stuff like that personally. But while he was waiting at the bar, he just kept drinking. He didn’t know what else to do. It’s a bar, after all. And the bartender must have seen this guy all alone, texting a group of friends that wasn’t planning on showing up, so he started giving my friend some shots, on the house. And my friend accepted. Normally alcohol had a pretty minimal affect on my friend, but that’s because normally my friend had a belly at least seventy-five percent filled with ice cream. And my friend got drunk, like really drunk. And he stood up to go to the bathroom and when he stood up he realized he was even drunker than he thought, like it all hit him at once, this wave of intoxication coursing upward through him, like a current, like a lighting bolt, hitting him directly in the head, and he knew he wouldn’t be able to keep it all inside. He was standing exactly in between the bathroom and the exit, so precisely in the middle that he hesitated for a second trying to calculate which path was shortest. And that delay was just too much. He went running for the exit, and he almost made it, but he didn’t. And just as he got close to the door, it opened, and it was all of his coworkers, they all felt terrible when they texted each other, each coworker thinking that he or she would be the only no-show, and when they all realized that nobody was going to my friend’s farewell, they all got up and brushed their teeth and put on their coats and headed over to the bar. And they all arrived at the same time, and they opened the door and my friend was just running, charging towards them, and by this point it was too late to do anything, eye contact was made for a second, my friend brought his hands to his mouth in a futile attempt to at least demonstrate that he didn’t want what was about to happen to happen, but all this covering did was cause everything to spray not in a straight line, but outward, radial, like a fan, like a spray, like putting your thumb over a garden hose.

The tale of the haunted coffee machine: A true story

I’m pretty sure I saw a ghost the other day. Well, I don’t know if I saw it exactly, but I definitely felt its presence. I was at work and this guy I work with came up to me and asked me if I hadn’t noticed anything strange lately in the restaurant. “Like what are you talking about?” I asked him. And he said, “You know, like ghosts or anything.” And whenever a ghost conversation comes up, I always get really excited, like the same excitement I used to feel when I read those Goosebumps books as a little kid. Even though Goosebumps, when you think about it, was a pretty lame series, none of the stories were really scary. Spooky, at best, all with really lackluster endings and gaping plot holes. Whatever, they were a bunch of little kids’ books. I remember one time my brother wrote a letter to R.L. Stine, the author of those books, asking him all sorts of questions, like, “How do you write your books so fast?” and not to be outdone by my little brother, I wrote a letter too, with even stupider questions, like, “What do you think would have happened if Spider-Man never got rid of his alien costume?” We both got letters back from R.L. Stine on the same exact day, and both of our letters were identical, photocopied, some bullshit about how he appreciates letters from the fans, and how he reads each one individually, and shares them with his wife and daughter. Even as a little kid I could tell he was lying, just from being in a family myself. Really? He reads every letter? Come on. I imagined my own dad coming home from work with a stack of correspondence and saying to us, “All right, everyone in the living room. It’s time for me to share all of my letters with you.” And besides, Mr. Stine, if you’re spending all of that time sharing our letters, why couldn’t you spend a second or two writing out a custom note? I mean, you are a writer right? And you write those Goosebumps books so fast, fast enough that you have enough free time to bore your wife and daughter by reading all of these out loud, each stupid fan letter you get in the mail every day.

Anyway, this guy at work starts talking about ghosts. And I’m like, shit, I have to come up with something, because I so want this to be a cool ghost conversation. Every time I think a ghost conversation is getting good, it always winds up disappointing, it’s the same feeling you get when you have a really great sneeze coming, and right as you open your mouth and tilt your head back and crunch up your face it just goes away, no sneeze, and you’re like, what the hell, it was right there. I was worried, mostly because I thought that if I didn’t come up with something cool to tell him, he wouldn’t feel at all pressured to tell me something cool in return. So I basically lied, and told him that one time I saw something out of the corner in my eye in the basement. Pretty lame, yeah, but I didn’t have a lot of time to think. “What about you?” I asked him. And he said, “One time I thought I saw something move past me, upstairs, towards the top of the staircase, but it was also out of the corner of me eye.” And I just kind of stared at him for a second before saying, “Oh, OK. Cool.” And that was it. Someone else overheard our conversation and chimed in, uninvited about how, “Well I saw a ghost one time!” but by this point I was already super bored with fake ghost stories and couldn’t bear the thought of being let down by any more disappointing make-believe.

But then later in the day, I was pouring hot water out of the giant coffee machine. There are three nozzles, one for regular, one for decaf, and one for insta-hot hot water. I was using the insta-hot. While I was holding the lever down for the hot water, my hand was directly under the regular coffee nozzle. And while I’m waiting for this teapot to fill up with water, I mean, it takes forever, such a long time. It might as well be called eterna-hot instead of insta-hot because, let’s face it, if you want a cup of hot water, it’s not coming out instantly. There’s some sort of mechanism inside that machine that’s heating up that water, and it’s taking a little while. Sure, maybe it’s a lot faster than boiling a pot of water on the stove. But insta? Like insantly? Hardly.

Well like I was saying, my hand is right under the regular coffee nozzle, and out of nowhere, hot coffee starts pouring out of it right onto my hand. It came out for maybe two seconds, just long enough to give me a nice scalding burn. Also, I got surprised by the shock of the coffee and I spazzed out and threw the half-filled pot of hot water, and guess who was walking by just as the pot flew out of my grip? That’s right, it was that other guy that told me that totally made up ghost story. And he got burned too. He jumped and turned to me and said, “What the hell man?” and I just said, “Sorry! The coffee machine went off by itself and burned me!” And he said, “That’s impossible! You need to pull the lever for coffee to come out!”

And it was true. This is a really old machine with a really big handle that you had to pull. There’s no way that it could have pulled itself. And even if it did pull itself, it would have stayed in the pulled position, not just switched itself back off. Plus, like I said, it’s a big lever, so I would have heard it making a big chnk sound as it switched on. And I would have heard it again when it switched off. But there was nothing. No sounds. And I told all of this to the guy who got burned. And he got it, like he totally got it. And then I got it. And both of our mouths hung open at the same time. And we were just staring at each other, and then we slowly turned, in unison, to the regular coffee nozzle. And we knew it. We said, “G-G-Ghost!” at the same time. It had to be true. We were both making up ghost stories and a real ghost must have overheard us and decided to teach us a lesson. And we both got spooked, big time.

I went home and wrote a letter to R.L. Stine about what had happened. I told him all about the haunted coffee machine. I told him, listen here’s the perfect story that we can use to reboot the Goosebumps franchise. This will put you back on the map! And I told him, if you’re too busy, I can ghost write it for you. Like not ghost like haunted, but like ghost like I’ll write it and it can still say R.L. Stine. Because I’m trying to be a writer, and I feel like I’m a natural storyteller. I didn’t hear anything for a while, but then my mom got a letter at her house from R.L. Stine addressed to me. It was the same exact photocopied note from fifteen years ago, all about how he shared my letter with his wife and daughter. Come on! You’re daughter’s got to be all grown up now! There’s no way she’s still living at home. What did you do, call her up and tell her about my letter? And what, did you share my idea with her? Are you going to steal my story? I’m just letting everyone know that if you ever read a book about a haunted coffee machine, it was all my idea and I was ripped off, because I came up with it first, and it really happened, it wasn’t a story, it’s true! I swear!

I’ve had just about enough of these unfounded claims and unwarranted accusations

If everyone would just stop staring at me for a second, I’m sure I’ll be able to explain. Those rumors you’ve been hearing about me are, well, they’re just that, rumors. And think about it, who would want to spread rumors about me? It doesn’t make any sense, right? But it totally makes sense. It was Andre. That asshole’s had it out for me for months. Ever since that picnic. You don’t know Andre? Good, forget I mentioned it. And don’t ask anybody about him. And don’t look him up on facebook. Trust me, he’s a huge loser and everything he’s been saying about me is a total lie. It stems mostly, I think, from a deep-seated jealousy, or a hatred, but that’s beside the point.

Those drugs? What can I say, except that they weren’t mine? I don’t really do drugs. I mean, that doesn’t count, I mean, I don’t really consider that a drug. But someone’s obviously trying to set me up. And I can only think of one person. But I’m not in the business of naming names, pointing fingers. I’m not going to stoop down to anyone else’s level. Nobody ever stoops down to my level, so why should I return the favor? Why are you looking at your cell phone? Is it Andre?

No, I’m just joking. I don’t even know any Andre. Just forget he exists. And I don’t even know what you’re talking about, drugs. I’ve never seen any drugs. Somebody must have made all of that stuff up. Why would I bring it up? I don’t know, I thought you were going to bring it up. Sorry, I’ve had a lot on my mind lately. A lot of nonsense. I heard this rumor that someone’s spreading some gossip about money and some drugs and, you know who’s really into drugs, right? Andre. You’re sure you’ve never met him, right? Good. Trust me, you’re going to want to keep it that way. He’ll ask you for five dollars, no big deal right? And he’ll wait you out like a month, two months, and then he’ll pay you back. And then like a week later he’s asking you for twenty, then fifty, then twenty again. And he’ll pay those back too, eventually. But then there’s a call in the middle of the night, and it’s Andre, and he needs five hundred dollars, right now, he can’t explain, but it’s urgent, but he’ll pay you back seven fifty tomorrow, the very next day. And then he disappears for a while.

Well just forget everything I said then. But ask around, Andre’s bad news. But don’t ask around, don’t talk about him unless someone brings him up. And if it comes up, and you’re roped into a conversation about him, let whoever you’re talking to know that I had nothing to do with any of this nonsense. Don’t like put it in there like I asked you to say something, just drop it in naturally, gracefully. And if this person still insists on continuing to talk about Andre, ask if they’ve seen my eight hundred dollars anywhere. I can’t find it. I started asking around about my money and all of the sudden there’re these rumors about me and drugs and …

No I never joined a cult. Fucking Andre. I went to one party, one time. I thought it was going to be a social thing. Yeah, maybe it was a little culty, but I didn’t bring anybody. Well, I didn’t force that person to come with me. They just came. And it’s not my fault if they found the whole presentation really convincing. You’ve got to stop asking so many questions. Don’t you trust me? Aren’t we friends?

Listen, do you have five dollars? I just went to the deli to get a sandwich and I totally forgot my wallet. I know, I’m such a space cadet sometimes. Anyway, the guy told me I could have the sandwich and pay him back next time, because I’m always getting sandwiches at that deli, I’m a regular. More than a regular. Seriously, the sandwich guy invited me to his wife’s baby shower. I couldn’t go, but I sent a gift. But I feel really bad about the sandwich, like what if I go back to pay him later but there’s a different deli guy behind the counter? And even though the guy says he’ll pass along the five bucks, what if he never does? And what if I go back the next day to get another sandwich, and my sandwich guy thinks that I haven’t paid him back? Like I’m just ignoring it? And he’s not going to say anything, he’s just going to stuff it inside, a little deeper, trying to forget about it, to let bygones be bygones, but it’ll grow, and he won’t forget, and the next time I forget my wallet, he’s just going to be like, sorry man, no money, no sandwich. No exceptions. And he’ll point to a little sign that he printed out on his computer, it’ll say exactly that, “No money …” just like I just said.

Thanks a lot. I’ll pay you back tomorrow. No, I’ll pay you back tonight. I’ll pay you six dollars. Just take it, I insist. I’m good for it. I’m a good guy. You tell that to Andre if you see him. Well, if anybody mentions Andre to you, you tell whoever’s talking about him that I’m a good guy. Well then just forget I said anything. Yeah, just forget all of it.

I always thought time travel would be cool, but I’m thinking lately that it would probably be really boring

What would I do with myself if I were living like three hundred years ago? Or even farther back in the past, four hundred, five hundred, ten thousand years ago? I simply can’t imagine a whole life where everyday goes by and there’s absolutely nothing to do. I’m picturing myself getting up in the morning. And then I’d have to go to the bathroom, but it’s hundreds of years ago, so there aren’t any real bathrooms, or toilet paper, and so I have to find some leaves, but knowing my luck there will only be poison ivy. But of course I don’t know the difference, and even if I wanted to learn, it’s not like the Boy Scouts have been invented yet, so who would I ask? Who else knows that type of stuff? So I’m all itchy and I can’t even take a shower, because maybe it’s winter, and there’s a good chance that I’ll freeze to death if I get wet. And showers don’t exist yet either. I mean, there’s probably some natural showers, like a nice not-too-big waterfall or something. But it’s probably freezing.

And the food’s got to be totally boring. No ketchup. No hot sauce. Where do you get salt from? There’s just gruel. Disgusting, boring porridges and basic sustenance. And then once you’re done with breakfast, what, go to work? Are there any jobs really? It’s probably just a whole life’s career making sure you can get enough gruel to make it to the next day. I’m guessing that means farming, or hunting, or stealing and running. So you go out and farm or whatever. And then you come back, another boring meal. And then what? Are you supposed to just sit around until the next day? I’m getting really bored just writing this out, imagining life, day in and day out, no TV, no Internet, no Taco Bell. No wonder humans have spent the majority of their time fighting. It’s at least slightly more entertaining than just sitting around. And I doubt there were even any good chairs, probably just a bunch of uncomfortable rocks, or a log that used to be kind of comfortable, but that was only for a year or so, before it started to get all rotten and bug infested.

If it’s winter, you’ve got to be miserable the whole time, nobody’s invented heat, nobody’s invented Gortex jackets, or those little warmies that you stuff into your pockets and boots on ski trips, you know, those little pouches that stay really hot for like seven hours. And then getting a drink of water must be the worst, all full of stuff, germs and dirt floating around in it, just like when Michael J. Fox went all the way back to the Wild West, and he asked for a drink of water, and it was brown. And that wasn’t even winter. Where do you get your water from if it’s a hundred years ago and it’s freezing? Everything’s frozen. Do you have to plan out your drinks like hours in advance, so you have enough time to defrost the ice?

I always think that it would be cool to be able to go back in time and just wow everyone with my knowledge of the future and my cool gadgetry that I’ve brought back with me. But it would get old pretty fast and I’d wind up really bored, again. I would need some sort of a wireless device that’s at least able to connect to the Internet in the future. Now that would be pretty cool. I could go on Youtube while everyone else is just sitting around looking at rocks or doing whatever it is they did for entertainment back then, like torturing smaller weaker people or punching each other in the face until one person gets knocked out. But what if some of the more intelligent people hear me always looking at my iPhone and laughing to myself, and they catch on to what I’m doing and insist that I share my futuristic technology? They’ll demand that I give it up and, despite my protests about continuity and the space-time continuum, they’ll insist, and they’ll enlist the help of some of the bigger past-people, and they might tear the technology right out of my hands. And I’ll scream, “No! You’re going to break it! You don’t know how to use it!” and they’ll say, “Shut up! What do you think just because you were born later that you’re smarter than us?” but that’ll definitely be the case. They won’t understand touch-screen technology at all, so they’ll just be holding my devices, my iPhone, my Game Boy, shaking them violently, getting frustrated that they can’t pull up videos or play games, totally not getting what they’re supposed to be doing, and it’ll all eventually break.

And they’ll turn to me and accuse me of sabotage. And I’ll have regretted coming back there in the first place, because now I’ll be stuck in the past, because they’ll have ruined my devices, my only methods of keeping in contact with the future, my only means of signaling to my crew that I’m ready to come home. It was probably a little shortsighted of me, not realizing that my phone would have eventually run out of power, and even though I brought several chargers, it’s not like there are any wall outlets that I could use to charge them up. I could try writing a message and leaving it somewhere that will eventually get discovered by archeologists in the future, hoping that whoever finds my note will deliver it to the proper time and place, to my colleagues, alerting them that these past-morons broke my technology, but how will I know where to put the message? And I’ll leave some clues here and some messages there, but nothing works, they must not make it all the way to the present day. It’s really hard to communicate any message even just a little further in the future. I’m just thinking about all the stuff I’m writing right now, and how it barely makes it to the afternoon, let alone a generation or two from now. I shouldn’t discount myself like that. Who knows? Maybe these texts will find their way down to our ancestors. If you’re reading this, ancestors, please come to the past and let me know. I promise I won’t use any knowledge of the future to alter the timeline. Please, I know what you’re thinking, that it must be really boring here in 2012, but it’s not. It’s not boring at all. I have XBOX. I’ll show you my iPhone. Come on, please! We can go get pizza! Think about all the fun we’ll have here. Did you see Batman yet? We can see Batman! Please visit me from the future! Please!