That REALLY can’t be right!

On any normal Tuesday in any normal year, a polite elf like myself might start his weekly article with “Wotcha, readers! How are ya’?”

But this has been quite an abnormal Tuesday for me and - truth be told - it’s not an entirely normal year. So, I’m going to begin like this:

Wotcha, readers! When are ya’?

You see, for me, time is currently a bit of an issue. Right now, like a slice of crinkle-cut gherkin, I’m in a bit of a pickle. I’m hoping this article makes it all the way to the present day, but that’s far from where I am. I think I’m sending this from the year 1823, but I’m not entirely sure.

How did I get here? It’s all a bit of a blur, but here goes…

It all started 200 years in the future from where I am now. 

Now that’s a weird sentence, but if you consider that I’m in 1823, it makes more sense… The year was 2023 which I’m guessing is when many of you are reading this. I was busily recording some Totally Terrific Tasks to send to the Boss. If I remember correctly, I had just sent a report on Georgia from Glasgow who help cleaned her Mom’s car every weekend. Lovely stuff, Georgia! I’ll be making sure Santa gets to hear about that.

I remember looking across a wide road to see a girl doing a great job picking up apples. Like I say - it’s all a bit of a blur… but fragments are coming back to me… Her bright yellow scarf. Her large red-brick house with a lumbering old apple tree in the yard. Apples strewn all over the square lawn. And I definitely remember thinking, “Ooh! I must find out who she is and make a note of this terrific task!”

The next thing I recall is that the alert light on my Tremendous Toboggan started flashing. My T.T. is an incredible mode of transport that Gizmo Elf built for me a few years ago (or, since I’m back in 1823, I guess you could say that he built it in over a hundred years’ time). The toboggan sends me all over the world to where the latest Terrific Tasks are being completed. It’s usually a surprise where I end up, but - let me tell you - I’ve never been as surprised as I was today (er, I mean yesterday, or two hundred years ago… I don’t know any more!)

I leapt onto the toboggan which whizzed off skywards like a mint in a pop bottle. So far, so normal. Suddenly I started spinning out of control. Everything around me started swooshing and swirling as if some black hole had swallowed me whole. So far, so abnormal. But then, before I knew it, the toboggan came smoothly to ground behind a stone wall on the edge of a large square of grass. 

Ahead of me was what looked like a building site. Bricklayers were hard at work laying the red bricks of what would no doubt soon become a house… Overseeing them was a man dressed in a top hat and tails. Fancy dress? A horse and cart trotted along the wide track. Hmmm… Something was afoot and it wasn’t a jingly elf slipper.

Where was I? Or, more to the point… When was I?

Thankfully, the Tremendous Toboggan has a built-in Hat Nav, so I put it on and took a look through the special goggles. 
“Hmmm…” I hmmmed. “It says I haven’t moved through Space at all. My location doesn’t seem to have changed. That can’t be right. And it also says the year is… Hang on! That REALLY can’t be right!”

But, after giving it some thought (and fortunately for those of you who like a good time travel story!) I think Gizmo’s Hat Nav is right… I know where I’m at and let’s just say it sure as anything ain’t where you're at.

And, right now, I have absolutely no idea how I’m going to make it back (or should that be forwards?).

Got to try and fit in, I guess, so - as they say where I am currently -
I remain, dear Reader,
Most obediently yours,
Toomer
PS. I was going to end with a joke about a black hole, but it sucks.