Time: A User’s Manual
Because everyone could use a refresher.
Congratulations on your new Time! In the past two years, many users have expressed concern that their Time has been behaving strangely. To minimize confusion, we are now including this User’s Manual with all new editions of Time. Please read these instructions quickly but thoroughly, as your Time is precious.
Terms of Use:
Mileage may vary. You may not transfer your Time, but bless your heart for asking. You may, however, share your Time with users who share theirs with you.
Installation:
To install your Time, all you have to do is exit your mother’s womb or wake up from a traumatic brain injury. If you are reading this, that means you installed your Time successfully!
Speed:
Your Time has a number of speed settings:
- Flying: To activate, just have fun with a group of friends. But not Janet, who tells long stories about Burning Man. (Note: Flying can become disconcertingly fast on Sundays.)
- Crawling: To activate, acquire a data-entry job or ask Janet a follow-up question.
- Standing Still: To activate, become a character in a romantic comedy or the Old Testament.
- Passing You By: To activate, compare yourself on social media to people you used to know.
Communication Preferences:
Users are automatically signed up for occasional messages from our team, usually consisting of unsettling grey hairs or experimental Richard Linklater movies. Opting out is not possible.
Pausing:
If you need a break from your Time, take ayahuasca.
Healing Function:
Your Time will heal all wounds. However, please be patient, as it often takes time to do so.
Sleep Mode:
When in sleep mode, your Time will play a screensaver of recent experiences, along with representations of your repressed desires and fears (one of our programmers added these as a joke).
Maintenance:
Be protective of your Time but generous with it. As much as possible, your Time should be taken, but not taken up. Take your Time off liberally, but take it out of your Day sparingly, and feel free to set your Time aside, especially if you are wont to lose track of it.
Please don’t kill your Time — we worked really hard on it. Also, set boundaries with Barbara in Sales because she’ll take advantage of your Time if you let her.
Trouble-Shooting:
If you think your Time may be malfunctioning, you can test it by watching a movie or TV show from before 2010. If you are mildly shocked at the levels of sexism, racism, and homophobia, your Time is working properly. If not, your Time may be frozen, or you might just be a Joe Rogan listener.
Some users believe that they do not have enough Time to pass through an infinite number of points in finite Space (Space is included in all post-1915 models of Time). These users do not understand integrals.
You may worry about Moments becoming lost in Time, in a manner reminiscent of tears in rain. Please do not attempt to confront us about this. It is a feature, not a bug. (It optimizes poignancy.)
That said, there are ways to search for lost Time, such as eating cookies nostalgically. Do so carefully, though, because this can lead to becoming borne back ceaselessly into the past. This, too, is a feature, optimizing tragedy.
Sometimes, users report that their Time has become circular. This can have many causes, such as repeatedly dating the same toxic personality type or being at an Ikea. If you’re concerned, try seeing a therapist. It may not address your specific issue, but it’s usually a good thing to do.
In more extreme cases, users report becoming trapped in one of those infinite time-loop situations. Escaping usually involves becoming a nicer person, which, again, is good advice regardless.
Spending vs. Wasting:
These concepts are extensions of the ethos of capitalism, and you should free yourself from them.
Wise Use:
The deepest wisdom is in the recognition of one’s own ignorance. Therefore, try to remain mindful of the fact that you have no idea what you’re doing with your Time. Ask yourself, “Why am I comparing prices on vacuum cleaners when I came into this store to buy gum?” Then answer yourself: “I don’t know.”
FAQ
Where did the Time go? Yes. Indeed.
Is anything Timeless? All things arise in Time; they appear and then they disappear.
Is Time a flat circle? Shut up.
Can I have some more Time? No.
Uninstalling:
Thanks to Slipping AwayTM technology, there is no need to uninstall your Time. After installation, you will immediately start losing hold of it, like sand slipping through your fingers, until it’s all gone forever — cool, right?
