What's At Stake

I was mowing the lawn when I heard the snap, crack and pop of time-travel about to happen.

The thing about time-travel is whatever you are touching travels with you. It's has to be that way to avoid the embarrassment of ending up somewhere else in time, naked.

My yard disappeared and there I was, traveling through the tunnels of time, holding on to my lawn mower. The time-travel tunnels echo, so you wouldn't believe the noise.

I ended up on the muddy ground of France during the 1400s. I don't think they considered mud a problem because there was so much of it.

There was a crowd gathered in the square and everyone was looking at me because of the lawn mower. I shut off the lawn mower and started coughing and pretended the sound had been coming from me. Back then if you were unexplainably strange, you were branded a witch and burnt at the stake.

Speaking of which, the crowd's attention went back to a woman who was about to be burnt at the stake. I joined the crowd. It turns out the toastee was Joan of Arc.

I never cared for history in school. I didn't have the attention span because I'm pretty much just interested in myself. So I look for ways to screw up big events from the past.

I turned the lawn mower back on and set it to automatic. The lawn mower moved erratically on its own. Everyone was convinced the lawn mower was a witch. They took down Joan of Arc from the stake and tied up my lawn mower in her place.

Joan of Arc came up to me and gave me a hug. Then she spoke to me in French. I don't speak French. So I nodded a lot.