Jim Collins and time travel

Here's one from a while back about my good friend, the late Jim Collins. I think there's a bit of the Douglas Adams influence in this one.


Young Galileo surveyed the field and by instinct realised that he'd left his sandwich at home, he was suddenly intrigued at the thought of why two pieces of bread and cheese would be called by that name, of course, it wasn't for another three hundred years that it would actually be called a sandwich, but young Galileo was always considered to be well ahead of his time.

Mrs Galilei had made him the cheese and tomato doorslab of a snack in the morning after she'd awoken the lad in his makeshift observatory. He'd been up polishing his telescope all night, tracking the moons mountains, Jupiters satellites, the phases of Venus and Mrs Poncinello's bathroom habits.

It was 1581 and Galileo had 61 years left to live. He was startled by that fact.

The farmhouse at the other side of the field was his intended destination, it was here that he was to meet Collins again, a young fair haired traveller of sorts, seeking answers to questions that had not yet been thought of and also a reliable source of St. Bruno ready rubbed in a land where Tobacconists had a strange habit of disappearing overnight.

Galileo shrugged at the lack of available sustenance and made his way across the field to the farms courtyard.

The two boys greeted each other.

Galileo explained to the other boy some problems he was having with the threaded telescope eyepiece and the lad nodded in a fashion that he would perfect. Without another word, the traveller reached into his knapsack and passed Galileo two things.

The first item was a sealed envelope, the second, a fresh cheese sandwich.

The boys shared the sandwich and a small thermos of tea. Galileo mused at the cylinderical object and wondered how it kept things hot. Perhaps there was a vacuum between two layers of polished metal, he thought.

As Galileo waved goodbye to the lad, he remembered the envelope, ripping the edge off he discovered a small slip of paper within.

The heading on the paper read "Thread Undercut Analysis"

Galileo smiled, knowing another piece of the puzzle was at hand, he skipped off into the distance, whistling a strange, yet familiar tune......