Tuesday, June 30, 2009

I read a lot of science fiction. One of my favorite topics, and one which is commonly maligned as hackneyed by most sci-fi aficionados, is time travel. I simply loves a good time travel yarn.

Not only do most sci fi fans view time travel as an exhausted topic, but there are serious concerns with the general plausibility of the concept. Between the paradoxes and modern science's inability to even hazard a guess as to how time travel might potentially work, nobody really takes it seriously. Except me. Here's why.

On Sunday I accidentally laundered my cell phone. I put it through a full wash cycle and then the better part of an hour in the dryer. Hank rescued it after about 45 minutes of me wondering why the dryer was making that god awful clunk-clunk-clunk noise.

I took the phone apart and let it dry for the last couple days. It could be that all it needs is a new battery, but so far it has shown no desire to do phone-like things, like turn on.

So, for the last 2 days, I've lived without a cell phone. I have, in effect, traveled back in time to the mid 1990s. I have been living as our ancestors lived.

I commute home unable to call my wife and ask if I should stop at the store to pick up something for dinner. I wander the streets of my fair city, wondering what time it is and lamenting the fact that I can't play crappy video games as I stand in line at the coffee shop. Life in the 90's was primitive indeed.

On the plus side, Nirvana's Nevermind album still sounds pretty good on my walkman.

9 comments:

nrd2 said...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/8117619.stm

Mike said...

I saw that article. Cute.

David said...

^^Darn it. I saw that article too and was going to post it here.

I guess the BBC is doing really well in reaching people.

Anonymous said...

The wonderful Spider Robinson once penned a story called "The Time Traveler." I can't do justice to his extraordinary writing except to say it's about a man who spends ten years in a South American prison. "A stone cube with no windows, no heat, and a pail for a toilet."

When he is finally released in the mid 1970s, he finds the entire world has changed politically, economically, technologically. We realize we are all time travelers, moving forward at the rate of exactly one second per second. Like your brief trip backward, this fellow found himself thrown forward in a virtual instant.

http://books.google.com/books?id=PHAbZxdIh2EC&printsec=frontcover&dq=Callahan%27s+Crosstime+Saloon

Sister--Helen said...

I washed my phone, Monday....I took the battery out of mine and laid it on it's side...Mine is going to work. I put the battery in for a minute yesterday.....But I have a spot of water under the screen....I laid it back on it's side...maybe it will go away...I thought it was stupid for me to wash it...I did not post it on my blog...

Mike said...

David, it's ok. You get half-credit.

Bones, I had forgotten that character, but I did read that book. I get half credit.

4th Sister, I'm going to assume that you didn't post that story on your blog out of embarrassment rather than thinking it wasn't blogworthy. Me? I have no shame.

Mike Duffy said...

"The Time Traveler's Wife," on the off chance you haven't read it, is a good time-travel yarn.

Diana said...

Try putting your phone in a bag of uncooked rice for 24-48 hours without turning it on. When my phone got soaked, I tried drying it out with no luck. I googled the problem and saw that rice works because it absorbs moisture. Phone has worked fine ever since.

Mike said...

Mike, I have orbited around that book, but have never read it. I'll give it another look though.

Diana, turns out my Father's Day gift was an iPhone, so I won't be needing to resurrect the iCrap.