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[lprkn]

Immunizing North and South America pre-European contact is a fun idea sometimes, just completely changing the course of history. No idea which way that would go, probably wouldn't reduce the mean level of human suffering that much, but it'd be pretty interesting.

What I really need is a multiverse telescope.

[wombat]

Edit: It's funny, I only chose to go back 80 years because I thought I would need a car to get away from things.

I love this. So American. But you know, there's something to be said for wanting to experience a time that's just different enough for life to be still, like, recognizable. Going back to like 1521 might be so overwhelming it would just fry your brain, you might not be able to get much out of it.

I am sort of inclined to keep Choop away from the time machine. He worries me.

[wombat]

There are also some family members I'd really like to see again, but they'd be really freaked out. Not sure about that one.

Hmm, I think this should be against the rules. I think you can't go back to part of your own life. Too many complications. I mean, with all the time-travel fiction we have experienced, by the time we invent it, there are some obvious mistakes we should have figured out not to make.

[wombat]

Oh and yeah, I'd just go back to the beginning of human kind to see how it went down

We have fewer of these answers than I'd expect. Think of all the questions you could answer. When I used to play a lot of Renaissance music, I thought I'd go back and figure out the answer to the questions about how the musical notation was interpreted. But then I realized I didn't really have the skill and they should send an expert. It would also be interesting if you could figure out something about how language evolved, but it would be hard to know when to go to, there's basically an infintity of moments to choose from, and would only one of them tell you anything if you couldn't get more of the sequence?

So what with the possibility of screwing up history and the likelihood of not answering the question.... yeah, I'm sticking with the thylacine and Oingo Boingo.

[dejavroom]

Back to Jesus' time to see how it all went down, perhaps make some cryptic remarks, Marty mcFly-like, to incensed Romans watching the crucifixion: "I guess you guys aren't ready for that yet... But your grandgrandkids are gonna love it."

[Carlos del Vaca]

i'd try to prevent 9/11 by going back to 1998 and inventing a scandal that prevents katharine harris from being elected as secretary of state for florida. snuff porn in her laptop or something puts a democrat in that seat, altering the catastrophic 2000 bush/gore election results process by enough to likely give the seat to gore, who wouldn't have been on vacation four months of the first eight in office.

Alternatively you could kidnap Monica Lewinsky, or arrange for her to get a great job somewhere away from Washington, or otherwise prevent her from blowing Bill Clinton. Then Gore probably wins that election easily.

[wombat]

You know what time I don't want to go back to? Before computers. I'm trying to give my busted arm a rest by working on writing in a notebook with a pen. OMG this is unbearably tedious.

[pmcd9]

Alternatively you could kidnap Monica Lewinsky, or arrange for her to get a great job somewhere away from Washington, or otherwise prevent her from blowing Bill Clinton. Then Gore probably wins that election easily.

If she didn't blow him someone else would have.

[jay-ell]

You know what time I don't want to go back to? Before computers. I'm trying to give my busted arm a rest by working on writing in a notebook with a pen. OMG this is unbearably tedious.

Really? I LOVE writing with a pen on paper. And I have terrible handwriting -- I think the key is to make sure that you don't care whether it's actually legible. Because I write extremely quickly, and hardly anyone else can read it (though I can always read my own stuff after the fact, and Pedro has learned to decipher it as well).

[jaydub]

Presumably the wrist you broke wasn't on your dominant side?  Because writing off-handed is really tiring.

[wombat]

No, thank god, it is the left wrist I broke, but composing on paper sucks. I do a LOT of rewriting. I believe in the shitty first draft at every level. I write a sentence to see how it looks and almost immediately rewrite it. I'm having to use a totally different approach of writing a very rough draft that I know I will change when I eventually type it in and resisting the impulse to change it as I go along on paper. Basically I am having to write sentences and paragraphs which are merely an indication that "there will be a sentence/paragraph here and it will do roughly this job."

[lprkn]

Assuming I have to stay there, I'm not going any place that doesn't have fairly capable dentistry.

[wombat]

You don't have to stay. That's a totally different game. Interesting everyone seems to care more about dentistry than, say, antibiotics?

[dejavroom]

I want this one. So steamy.

[Mr Trout]

Funny you mention metacarpals, Ash, because I broke the second one (index) on my right hand about 6 weeks ago. Try working outside in -15 to -25° for hours at a time when you can't flex your fingers. Now that is a recipe for some mild frostbite. I'm going to assume you broke yours laying some dude out in a bar brawl rather than hitting a tree while skiing like I did.