In the year 2037, the past is tomorrow's yesterday. President M. Bison rules the anarcho-syndicalist American Empire with an iron fist. Shark Week has bloated to 38 mandatory, curfew-enforced weeks of documentary footage. And the Princeton we know is dead and gone, replaced by ... FuturePrinceton2037!)
Weather Guy: Hello? Why did someone named Rufus ask me to hand-deliver a forecast to the triple basement of Fine when one could simply read about this weekend's cool, cloudy and rainy conditions in today's season-finale edition of The Daily Princetonian?
(Sees sign reading "FREE DIPPIN' DOTS: THIS WAY.")
Mmm, Dippin' Dots. Hey, I don't remember a chrono-vortex in this broom closet!
(Time travel goes here.)
Rufus: Greetings, one called the Weather Guy. I am Rufus, leader of the Order of YES!, all praise to Dean Fred, peace be upon him.
WG: Oh no, I knew I should have slept some time in the past 93 hours.
Rufus: Sorry to interrupt your finals week, but we need you. You see in the year 2037, Princeton has fallen upon hard times. The first signs of trouble began shortly after your time, when the one you call Tilghman renamed campus buildings after panelists on "The View." By 2017, banning of legacy admissions led to civil war, in which loyalists were defeated at the Battle of Meredith Viera Field. Now, America's elite attend Berklee Online University and Real Medical Pharmacy for college, as well as great deals on Enzyte, all-natural male enhancement.
WG: Wait. How do I know this is really the future?
Rufus: In the future, Dippin' Dots are the ice cream of the present.
WG: Oh. But seriously, why not just throw money at the problem? It's the Princeton way.
Rufus: In 2008, your Tilghman converted the entire endowment into Susan B. Anthony dollars in honor of the 160th anniversary of the Seneca Falls convention, and the dollars were subsequently devalued by President Rooney in 2009.
WG: No money, and no legacies from which to get money. Is there hope?
Rufus: Science be praised, yes. Six months ago, the administration accidentally admitted the first legacy in over 20 years, the Prophecied One who will restore balance. We believe he is the son of the one your primitive Facebook wall postings refer to as "Wilsharf." For his own protection, he fled three weeks ago to the last remaining free city on earth: Newark, a lighthouse of arts and culture.
WG: I fail to see my role, Rufus. I specialize mainly in trash culture, with a special focus on the TGIF lineup from 1991 to 1994.
Rufus: Well, in the Great Circuiting of 2029, all copies of the distance formula were lost: all but one, which was subsequently locked in the Mudd Library, now known as Star Jones Library. You possess unique skills which allow you to retrieve this forbidden knowledge, with which we can finally calculate the distance to Newark.
WG: You guys forgot the distance formula? You mean square root of x squared minus x ... y ... carry the one ... ah, crap.
Rufus: See? It's not easy. Fortunately, you will have my associates Theodore Logan and William Preston to assist you on your journey. Sciencespeed, Weather Guy!
(Mudd Library, after several hours of nonlinear travel)
WG: Ok, exactly what's the problem? Do you need me to prox you in?
Logan: Negative. You see, during the Friendster Rebellion of 2021, for security the floor of the Jones library was replaced with red-hot lava.
WG: I was pretty good at that when I was in first grade.
Preston: Naturally. The Order traveled back in time to 1982, introducing the floor-is-made-of-lava game to a decade of Reagan babies. You, one they call Weather Guy, are not just "pretty good" at the red hot lava game ... you are the greatest who has ever lived!
WG: Wow, it's like all of history exists for me!
Logan: Of course you think that, you go to Princeton. It is time, Weather Guy, to do the task you were born to do.
WG: In the words of Waldo Heraldo Faldo, no problem, Bob.
(Navigates the lava with ease, retrieving the copy of "Trigonometry and You: A Houghton-Mifflin Mathventure.")
Preston: D equals 43 miles! We're coming, Chosen One! Oh no, look!
(The sun sets behind Behar Stadium. Enormous video monitors and speakers rise from sidewalk.)
Loudspeaker: You're watching the Discovery Channel. Explore your world!
Logan: Science damn it! It's Shark Week!
Preston: We'll be chased every step of the way to Newark!
Loudspeaker: The Great White Shark. With over 1,000 teeth arrayed in six fearsome rows, it's one of nature's most perfect killing machines.
WG: Oh ... my ... science.
(To be continued ... in the future! P.S. You just lost The Game! LOL!)
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