what we got after the first viewing of Primer.

So after I saw the movie, I asked Brian about it. This is what we got:

• The time machine allows objects to bounce between time A and B.  A is when it is turned and B is when the object is put in.
• Things need to sit in the time machine for a while, to bounce between A and B. And actually, there are several trips back and forth, so things age fast in there too.
• They could easily go back a day and make a killing in the stock market. Which they did.
• They were afraid of what would happen when they ran into their “doubles”. They called them doubles, but I think they are really the “originals”. But no one asked me.
• They would go turn on the time machine (time A – say monday morning) and then spend the day in a hotel without contact with the world. Then check the stock market, pick a stock, and go back into the time machine (time B – say tuesday morning).
• They would pop out at time A (monday morning) and then play the market and make money. They didn’t need to worry about running into their doubles/orginals because their doubles/originals were in the hotel.
• Then they started to think about what would happen if they ran into their double/orginals.
• They started to carry their cellphone while in the hotel room, which was kind of not keeping with the whole “don’t contact the world so that when we live this time out the 2nd time, we can act normally” routine.
• Then they started to not trust each other so much – “What is worse – being paranoid or finding out you should be paranoid?”
• Then the guy had to use the “failsafe” time machine. I really loved that part. This was a separate machine that he turned on before any of the other stuff happened. So that if anything went wrong, he could go back to it’s time A which was before any of the other stuff happened…and maybe fix things?
• Then someone’s got some party with someone’s ex-boyfriend and there’s a shotgun and things unravel from there.
• Lots of cool drama going on that I was only aware of in a meta sense. In that – I knew something good was going on, I just wasn’t understanding it.

The movie is only about 1:15 long. Watching it a second time has helped.

Hopefully this little blurb will convince you to watch it and to discuss.

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Oh – and some try to scare me about the hills of Portola Valley.  And there are some hills, but I figure they can’t be that bad, we’re not doing the La Honda hill. Twain is nuts. I think he’s got helium instead of bone marrow too.  I might have cookie dough. Or some deep fried sausages – like the kind they serve at Shoney’s…

But after finding out last week’s ride was only 250 feet up and I was pretty much wasted after it – and this weekend’s got 700 or so up (3rd page) I would start to second guess myself and my overflowing blind self confidence except for the fact that the 700 feet happen in the first 8 miles. So we’re done with it fast.  I can deal with that. And that since we start at 100, it’s only 600 feet! Math is my friend. Math can be your friend too…it helped the dudes in Primer.