Basic Investigation Skills Tutorial No. 1

by Frank Riccobono

How to Read the Last Message Written on a Memo Pad

1. Observe the indentations made by the pen of the writer on the top sheet of the pad.
2. Grab yourself a pencil with a soft lead.
3. On a separate piece of paper, sketch out a design for a rudimentary time machine.
4. Devote years and vast sums of money to the realization of your design.
5. When the machine is fully operational, set your temporal coordinates based on your initial observations of the memo pad.
6. Journey to the past, being careful not to cause any alterations to history.
7. Read the note before it is torn from the memo pad.
8. See that it was a note from your wife to buy eggs on your way home from work.
9. Realize that you never bought those eggs and to do so now would cause a disastrous paradox.
10. Return to the future (i.e. your relative present).
11. Remember to buy eggs on your way home from the lab.
12. Forget that your wife left you years ago due to your slavish devotion to this research project.
13. Weep when confronted with the reality of your own hubris.

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