I wouldn't use it. I'd just let it sit in my house.

I was watching Louis C.K.'s standup special Shameless, and he talks about an annoying friend of his who initiates a conversation by asking: "What would you do if you had a time machine?" This is a ploy to get Louis C.K. to ask HIM what HE would do if he had a time machine, but Louis C.K. sees through this thinly-veiled ruse and taunts his friend: "You know what? I wouldn't use it. I'd just let it sit in my house. I'd put my drink on it."

This got me thinking: why would somebody have a time machine but never use it? I have to think about this kind of shit because this is where thread ideas come from, especially when you lazy fuckers aren't posting anything in the Suggestion Board (HINT HINT). Hmmm...

FOCUS: What if you had a time machine, but it could only be used for one trip. One way, no return. Would you use it? When? Where would you go?

RULES: There is only one seat in the time machine. Also, it's a "Certified Grandfather-Paradox-Free" [1] time machine. You can go back in time and kill your grandfather. From your perspective, then, your grandfather will be dead. The original timeline where your grandfather lived, fucked your grandmother, and eventually caused your birth and your travel back in time still happened - it's just inaccessible to you.

[1] Slogan: You can have some of the universes all of the time, and all of the universes some of the time, but you can't have all of the universes all of the time [TM].

 

Honestly, if I could only take a one way trip, I probably wouldn't use it. It would be amazing to take a glance at the future, but what if the future is some post apocolyptic waste land where all the white girls have small asses. What would I do then Mr. Fried Potato Head?!?! If white girls aren't packing some junk in the trunk that's no place I want to stay!

And as far as going to the past, if my hours of sleeping through history taught me nothing else, I did learn one valuable lesson; 40 years or more in the past, being not white was pretty shitty. But I guess being a pirate would be kind of fun.

 

In the immortal words of Louis CK:


I'd probably just go a few decades into the future. Enough to be able to see some new inventions and shit, but not enough to arrive in a future where dolphins have taken over.

 

I would totally pull a Back to the Future. Grab a Sports Almanac and travel back just a couple of years back. Call me boring or greedy but man, life would be easy.

 

My favorite skit involving time machines.



If I had a time machine, I would go back to the early 18th century, and do my darndest to prevent the 20 amendment from happening.

 

I would wait until right after they draw the numbers for the Mega Lottery, write them down on my arm and go back 2 hours and buy a ticket.

 

I think a key detail here if you were traveling into the past would be whether you were physically traveling into the past with no changes to your current self, or would it be more along the lines of taking your current mind, which would include all your knowledge/maturity/experience, and sending it back into a younger version of yourself.

In the former instance, you wouldn't be able to interact with anyone you know because your younger self would still be around, so that would be a bit of a bummer. In the later, you could blow through high school again with your advanced knowledge and skills, and of course do as Binary said and be nice to all the girls that turned out to be stunning after high school.

Either way, you would want to invest in a few choice companies; Google, facebook, etc. Then just sit back and live the easy life.

Of course that brings up a whole other snake's nest of possibilities. What about 9/11? Do you warn anyone? If you do and the government comes around wanting to know how you knew that some terrorists were going to attack America, how do you explain that one? All that money wouldn't do you much good when you get thrown in a plain white van with a black bag over your head and are never seen again.

 

After the last couple of weeks I've had, I'd dial in the end of the Earth and watch the fireworks or the fizzle... doesn't really matter which.

 

If I'm transported into my younger self with all the knowledge I have today, I'd go back to about five years old and convince everyone I'm some sort of freaky genius. I would write novels, play the stock market, learn musical instruments, and completely destroy the self-esteem of my elementary-school bully.

If I am transported as my present self, I would put my drink on it.

 

I'd jump ahead to December 2012, because I'm fairly certain I'll be some sort of John Connor-esque hero. I'm special. And I don't want to wait a whole year and a half for people to start naming their babies after me.

 

I'd go back and find out who REALLY killed Biggie.

 

Best time machine sketch ever...

Upright Citizens Brigade - Time Machine

I'd go back to the 1750's and become a privateer off the coast of the Carolinas. No need for a return ticket home, I'm happy to stay put.

Obviously I'd carry a backpack full of modern medicine, schematics for building a Colt 1911, as well as maps detailing the locations of major gold finds out in Deadwood SD.

Fuck that would be fun.

 

Fuck that, I'd go back and save him and Tupac. Along with the requisite stock picks/lottery numbers/sports winners of course.

 

I would probably go back to the early 70's and start a computer company maybe call it microsoft or apple.

You can have your lottery winnings.

 

Because owning it requires work lots of work, and investing in it requires logging into my e*trade account?