Warnings From the Future

If you know me, you know how much I like wormholes, time travel, and the idea that I oftentimes return from the future to fuck with myself in the past.

Which is why I'm worried tonight.

You see, it started out like any other night. I sat in my room thinking that I should get food, but was too lazy to walk a block down the street to Pete's Burgers to get a pastrami sandwich before it closed. I was not lazy enough to ditch the plan altogether, however, and walked at around 9:30, when they were long closed. No worries, though, as I walked a half block away and bought a 12 pack of Miller Light, because we were out of beer at my place, and I like being calorie conscious when relaxing in the evening (ironic that I'm getting a pastrami sandwich then, I know).

That solved the empty spot in our fridge normally devoted to our favorite hops-based beverage, but not the empty spot in my stomach (and for that matter, not the empty spot in my soul that I'm hoping a woman will fill with her love one day, but that's really neither here nor there). Determined to get a slightly greasy sandwich and some fries while I'm at it, I resolved to drive out to Chano's*.

Now, the last time I had a pastrami from Chano's was freshman year. I felt awful afterwards. Like, really really terribly nauseous, and it should be noted that I was dead sober, because if you know what Chano's is, you know it is very rarely visited by sober folk. So I realized going into this trip that I'm rolling the dice, but you know, when I want a pastrami and fries, I can't be denied.

But my confidence was deterred when I returned to my apartment to find a sizeable pile of vomit at the top of my parking space.

I didn't inspect it closely, and it was dark out, and furthermore who really inspects vomit? But what I did see was frightening.

Fries. Lots of em.

Oh shit, I thought. Future Spencer is warning me about this pastrami! I'm going to get sick from it, then immediately learn how to time travel and warn myself with the vomit! Which I guess has its upside because I learned how to time trav--

I'll spare you the rest of my thought rambling, and bring you up to the present. I'm thoroughly convinced this ominous pile of puke is telling me I should not eat this pastrami, sitting wrapped and harmless in front of me.

But will I still eat it?

Yeah, probably. But at least I won't be able to say I didn't warn me. 

*This was going to be what I originally blogged about today, and my title was going to be "Triumph of the Will," which would mean the blog would service as a long setup to me realizing that I named a blog post after an infamous piece of Nazi propaganda filmmaking at the end of said post. Because I think stuff like that's funny.

Future Me

I'm going to drop a weird recurring thought of mine on you guys today.

Let's say you're at a public establishment, preferably by yourself because it works better that way. If you're with people and do this, you kind of come off as a jackass or autistic (I think I can pull off both at different times). You start people watching, because let's face it, you only brought the book to look cool, even if you did try to convince yourself you were going to read five pages before your food got there, rendering you unable to continue reading without sacrificing an eating hand.

You see someone significantly older than you. There's something strange about this person, be it posture, a movement, a facial feature, or even a shirt they're wearing.

Now, in your mind, do you immediately assume this person could very well be you from the future, spying on yourself when you were younger?

Because I sure as hell do. And not even in a joking way. My mind actually tricks itself into thinking this for five seconds before I can say, "fuck off, that would never happen."

But even after I say that, my mind still kind of believes it could be me. It's an impossible-to-correct compulsion, I think. No matter how much I can convince myself that time travel is a near-impossibility, the promise of a non-linear existence in time and space proves to be way more comforting and totally neato in compared to the accepted truths.

And when I finally do get the opportunity to time travel, I'll jump for joy (embarrassing whatever scientist gave me the opportunity) and say, "Fantastic, take me to the Blockbuster Video off of Avocado at around 3:45 on July 14th, 2003. I got some thoughts that need confirmin'"