It was intended to be a typical Saturday. Dinner with old friends in the distant future on the far edge of the galaxy. Nothing special, nothing gained, save a little cameraderie and maybe a chicken leg.
The evening took something of a right turn when I stopped in mid-1970s London to secure a hotel room for my return. London is a lovely place, and hasn’t changed much since my second encounter with it in the 19th Century. 1970s London, however, holds a special place in my heart despite, or perhaps because of, its occasional pretenses to being ahead of its time.
I am by nature inclined to curiosity, so I suppose that it was only natural that on my way to Pall Mall I became rather distracted by a two-story tall bipedal reptile. The hotels are open all night, I reasoned, and followed the creature until it led me to a crime scene. Well, I’m not doing that again, and to make a long and boring story short, I never did make it to a hotel.
Instead, I passed the evening partying with the Chinese Ambassador and his staff on Portland Place. Call me racist if you like, but nobody prepares chicken quite like the Chinese. Though my Mandarin is both rusty and childish, we all got on well enough; even now, my heart is warmed by vague memories of imbibing at least one bottle of Vodka and leading my hosts on a tour of the proletariat area to consort with prostitutes.
The evening went so well that when I regained consciousness the following morning I discovered that I had been wrapped in an old army blanket and placed on a slow boat to Canada. On those red-white-and-red shores, I breakfasted with laborers. The fact that it was early afternoon by this point explains the lack of back bacon and I wasn’t too terribly disappointed.
I spent the day moving from one coast to the other, and from there it was a hop to the South Pacific, where I touched down on a small island that I once saved from a horde of demons. The natives are deeply friendly, even if they do have an unfortunate habit of cheating at ping-pong. After a quick round of golf (12 under), in an act of lingering gratitude for my previous trifling service I was treated to their simple fare: mussels and spring rolls, while a handful of the more aggressive locals beat the living hell out of one another.
I have had larger feasts, with loftier personages, in an atmosphere of greater spectacle, yet I would not have traded this evening for any of them. It is my sincere hope that the smile which never left my face was taken as a compliment and not a side effect of mass quantities of truly excellent beer.
As the moon passed the halfway mark on a spangled night, I approached the wreckage of an old KGB spy satellite that had crashed into a lagoon a few months previously. From the components I constructed a rejuvenation/transportation module. I settled into its gentle hum with a smile wider than ever. This, this, was a weekend worthy of a man of my caliber, a weekend as of old, and not only was the feel of it exhilarating…
It had the feel of a homecoming. Whatever malady which made me so dull has quite passed, and I am once again ready to enjoy life with style.