I want to build a time machine. But not the usual kind. While I'm sure it would be fun to zip back and forth through the ages, I think that we're all pretty familiar with the problems and paradoxes such time travel would create. Say, for example, you build a conventional time machine, and go back in time. Suppose you inadvertently cause some chain of events that results in your grandfather failing to meet and marry your grandmother (maternal or paternal, it doesn't matter for the purposes of this argument). In theory, you would cease to exist. The paradox is, if you cease to exist, you could have never invented the time machine in the first place, and therefore could never have altered the timeline. While some of the the more clever amongst us may have a solution for that problem, I don't want to mess with anything that could result in my never having been. While it may not be a considerable loss to most people, I'm rather fond of me, and would miss me, if I were gone.

No, I want to tackle a much simpler concept, which I think would have many more practical applications, and would thus be substantially more MARKETABLE (the profit motive lies behind many of the world's better inventions). Have you ever noticed how sometimes, like when you're in a supremely boring meeting, at a bad party or watching the worst movie you could imagine with someone who REALLY wants to watch it, time just d-r-a-g-s by? Minutes seem like hours. While such a phenomenon is not so exciting under those circumstances, imagine what life would be like if you could create the same effect during pleasant times! Having a great date, make it go on for hours, and still make curfew! Need to study for a test, you can pull an all-nighter and still get 8 hours rest! Imagine the impact on the vacation and tourist industries, when people can take an entire two-week vacation (and spend the requisite cash to do so) in just two days! Imagine the boon for business, who could give all employees a month paid vacation and still get the same level of productivity out of them! This is an idea whose time has come....we just need to determine the nature of that phenomenon, and we're on our way to easy street. And nobody has to worry about inadvertently screwing up grandfather's love life...