My first encounter with time travelers...

A couple of years ago I was managing a Swatch watch store in Glendale, California. On the particular evening of the encounter with the two time travelers, I was accompanied by my friend and employee, John McCampbell.

Backstory:

Not only is John McCampbell a terrific watch salesman but, like many young people living in the Los Angeles area, he aspires to something more: He wants to be a rock-n-roll star. To make a long story short, John and three of his buddies moved to California from New York in the hopes of getting their band signed to a record label. Two years later, they achieved just that. Now the lucky little bastard is on tour and he has a CD that you can buy at any cool record store (for more info click the link at the top).

The Story:

This night began like any other night. John and I had spent the first few hours of our shift skillfully shooting rubber bands at the ceiling at just the right trajectory to send them ricocheting into a Dixie cup in the center of the floor, when these two girls came in and began to shop. We wrinkled our noses and stashed our rubber bands like any self-respecting salesman would.

"Would you like to try that on?" I said, motioning to a Skin watch with pink fluorescent bands.

"No thank you. Just looking."

I frowned, and jerked my head at John to go for the kill.

"These are our Skin watches," John said dutifully. "They're the thinnest watches in the world. The tiny mechanisms have--"

"I'm actually looking for a watch for my boyfriend," she interrupted. "What do you recommend?"

John led her over to the "man" watches (even though Swatch claims to be unisex, I don't think a man would wear a watch with pink bands, and apparently neither did John). He showed her the favorite stud watch of the month.

"I don't know," she said, squinting her eyes at the large dial. "What do you think, Grant?"

I looked up, startled that she'd called me by name. "It's a great watch," I said. I looked down to where my nametag normally was clipped to my black polo shirt, but it wasn't there. "How did you know my name?" I asked.

The girl looked up, obviously caught off guard. "I...uh..." She glanced at her friend for help. "Um...your friend said it."

John gave me a No-I-didn't-she's-a-big-fat-liar look.

Then the girls sort of made excuses to leave rather abruptly, and we never saw them again. Afterward, I explained my theory to John:

"They're time travelers, John. I'm telling you. That's how they knew my name."

"Yeah, totally."

"You see, they're like tourists from the future. They came back to see the famous musician"--I bobbed my head up and down as he humored me with an air guitar pose--"and of course they wanted to see me, the famous author!"

"Yeah, you're really on to something."

"Of course! I mean, when you think about it, it makes perfect sense: They go back in time to the right place at the right time and they get to see two famous people for the price of one. This confirms it: we're gonna make it someday!"

"Yeah."

Conclusion:

That was my first experience with time travelers. Stay tuned for encounter number two, which happened just a couple of weeks ago. Oh boy!