In Times Like These (In Times Like These, #1)

by Nathan Van Coops

“Don’t assume that because you know something in the future won’t happen, that you can do nothing. Sometimes the reason it doesn’t happen is you.”

“If you meet experienced time travelers, you can usually trust that they are intelligent. The nature of this business rapidly weeds out the morons.”

while life is not always predictable or necessarily enjoyable, it certainly holds no lack of surprises.”

I can't help but feel like there’s a purpose to all of it, and that somehow things are going to work out."

“Not all time travelers you meet are out to do great things. Sure, some are reminiscent of bygone eras, some are seeking adventure, but some are just looking for a way to escape the IRS.”

“It doesn’t pay to insult another time traveler. In fact you should make it a rule of thumb to never anger anyone today, who can go back and stab you yesterday.”

You never know when you might need to rewrite what you’ve already written.”

“If you are going to go through the trouble to build an underground tunnel, you may as well keep up the mystery,”

one thing that many people fail to realize when talking about time travel theory, is that one cannot effectively travel through time without also traveling through space. If we were to travel backward in time, one day, to this exact location in the universe, we would find ourselves out in the cold dark of space, waiting for the earth to get to us as it orbits around the sun.”

“Are we going to be able to use these to get home?” Blake asks. “In time.” Quickly smiles. “Pun intended.

The little boy in me that has always dreamed of super human abilities has awakened again. I think about the possibilities of what time travel might enable. I could visit moments in history I’ve always wanted to see. I could go to a Beatles concert, see the first person walk on the moon on the day it happened, figure out who shot Kennedy. I could go farther back, see the Wright brothers make the first flight at Kittyhawk. What if I could witness the Gettysburg Address?

It’s essential that you grasp the basics well, or all the more complicated knowledge I teach you will be useless. It’s no use bestowing the theory of transverse timestream navigation on someone who is going to teleport themselves in front of a steam-roller on their first jump.”

“Don’t time travel immediately after eating. You’ll waste a good meal and leave everyone a nasty mess.”

bark mulch

Thought they were supposed to be on the east coast. Only west coast calls it bark-a-mulch. East coast just calls it mulch.

As a teacher of anything it is often difficult to remember that just because you have covered something does not mean it has sunk in properly, or really been processed to the point of understanding.

“I once met a time traveler who insisted on only traveling to his own birthdays. He claimed he was over a thousand years old. I found the idea rather ridiculous, but I have to admit, he did get a lot of free drinks that way.”

When the stars come out, it makes me wonder where I’ll be the next time I’ll see them.

Last night in 1986. I wonder how far we’ll have made it by tomorrow night.

“If you post your used concert tickets on Craigslist and someone actually buys them, you know you’ve found yourself a time traveler.”

“You’d rather be the one launched into space, than to have to feel guilty?” Blake asks. “Yeah. I don’t want that on my conscience,” Francesca replies.

“You’d be surprised how wrong textbooks can be, too. I’ve realized that people are happier thinking what they know is true. Telling them the actual truth doesn’t always improve things.”

“Don’t worry. The sky never hurt anybody. It’s hitting the ground that gets you.

“When you run into yourself from another time, don’t worry too much about what you’re going to say. The universe won’t collapse if you fail to say exactly the right thing at the right time. Feel free to give yourself a few nice compliments, too. It’s not every day that you can surprise yourself with some sincere admiration.”

Carson was great at everything. Great at living. How could he be the one to die?

“There’s your first mistake.” Bob stands up and takes his plate to the kitchen and sets it near the waffle maker. “You should never pass up good food just to deal with your personal problems.”

You can’t think about time as a line. It’s only linear in places it’s never been changed. And it can potentially be changed anywhere. It’s better if you think about it as a sort of spider web, or a snowflake.”

“You know that scene in The Wizard of Oz when Dorothy climbs out of the balloon to chase Toto, and the wizard can’t take her home because he floats away without her?” “Yeah.” “I think we’re Dorothy.” “That’s okay.” I lower my gaze to the ranch around us. “We’re not going home yet. We still have our witch to melt.”

“Time travel is a very effective way to sober up. It does however involve trying to make precise calculations while inebriated. I have visited some unexpected new places that way, but I can’t say I’d recommend it as common practice. ”

Surviving isn’t all there is to winning, Ben. A lot of good men have died in the act of doing something great. That doesn’t mean they lost.”

“Do you think, that when all these different versions of us, how ever many of us there are . . . when we die, do you think we share a soul?”

Guard your minutes and seconds closer than your dollars and cents. You can predict when you’ll be out of money, but not when you’ll be out of time.”

What happened, happened. You can never change the past. Not really. You can just choose to live in a time where things are different.”