I had a non-covid cold in February and March. That was a lot of stress trying to figure out whether I was sick or sick. Very luckily, it was just a lot of stress. Now, I could avoid that stress.
Not trip and fall in early February in an entirely avoidable accident.
“Accidentally” get stranded in New Zealand with my work laptop and my dog? (I really don’t know how that would work, but i’d have 2-3 months to figure it out.)
Make DAMN sure I have ample reserves of goods that are going to go scarce. Maybe get in gear on finding another job before it goes totally rage-inducingly crazy in March.
Invest in toilet paper, masks, Plexiglas, and whoever makes those plastic containers food is delivered in.
Take a Saturday off work and go to Toronto to visit people before the rail blockades start biting. (Remember February?)
Sadly, going back to January is not enough time to make larger changes, like looking for a girlfriend or boyfriend.
id figure out how to buy oil, and every travel industry stock I could afford so I could short it all straight to hell and make a nice wad of cash
We’re preppers, so already had a large stock of N95s, paper products, sanitizers, meat, etc. I’ve made notes on how things were used, so I’ll be stocking back up with slightly different emphasis.
We changed investments to low-risk too early (3Q 2019) so I’d fine tune that some.
I would have taken a few more road trips early in the year if I’d known the lockdowns were coming.
Other than that, not much would be different.
I’d’ve said the hell with work and visited my sister in early March.
I’d’ve bought a small chest freezer. Filled it up. Bought tons of TP and masks.
I’d’ve gotten the internet.
I’i’ve bet on the Superbowl.
Gone to Barcelona two weeks earlier.
Before going to Barcelona:
Made sure that the freezer was full (⅓ breakfast muffins ⅔ main dishes).
Bought birthday cards, mother’s day car and father’s day cards (really difficult to do when the shops are closed).
Make sure have non-expired dry yeast, sugar, flour, and other baking goods.
Bring home one of my monitors. Working 3 months with only a laptop screen, after normally have 2x27" monitors is not my favorite.
Get 6 months of prescription meds.
Buy lots of coffee beans.
Fly to Atlanta to visit my brother, who would die - unavoidably - in three weeks.
Wouldn’t do anything else differently.
You have no useful knowledge of the Superbowl. Chances are it won’t even be KC/SF due to butterfly effect.
For the spring semester, we sent our 4th grader to a private school. Public school wasn’t working for him, and he needed a reset while he worked on some things. Not cheap.
Well, most of the semester was spent taking classes online, obviously. So almost a complete waste of money.
Zoom stock. Short airlines and oil companies.
I’ve posted this before but here’s a funny 3 minute sketch about a woman who visits her January self from late April:
I might have bought two or three of the 30-mega roll TP in late February instead of the one pack I bought and am still using.
Maybe bought the next size larger freezer, again, in February, after the garage fridge died.
Prepare to be laughed at when at a business for hairstylists educational seminar if I said “Hey, when you all get home, clear your books after next weekend and prepare to be unable to work for three months. Order earloop masks and disposable capes and lay in a good supply of hand sanitizer, fresh Barbicide, and figure out how to survive on about half as many clients per day as you see now.”
A lot of the same things mentioned above, plus … since we postulate that I’d know everything I know now, I would complete my tax returns promptly and easily, avoiding the torture and procrastination that I actually went through trying to figure it out. Similarly, since I moved in April, I’d be able to save a lot of time on the moving efforts - it took a while to figure out where I wanted to put stuff and how best to unpack it. With precise knowledge of how I wanted everything to end up, I’d complete the move much more quickly.
Y’know, thinking about it, I realize just how difficult 2020 has been - even for someone like me, who has been spared the worst consequences of all the terrible things that have happened so far. I sure hope the year gets better for everyone.
Don’t fight the hypothetical - I think the OP pretty much rules out ‘butterfly effect’.
Plus, one person flip back ~170 days isn’t going to change that much. The Chiefs Superbowl I would think would be safe (unless you are a member of an NFL coaching staff)
Nothing was explicit in the OP. He makes an offhand reference to lottery numbers but doesn’t guarantee they will remain accurate, (which they won’t).
I am certain that under the OP’s parameters that the minor changes you make to your life will affect other people in minor ways who will affect other people etc. to the point that the Jan 4 games will have at least some difference in the starting play, and once a small difference sets in, the entire game will be different, and thus the whole post season. The minor ripples will not be stopped.
My wife was scheduled to have some complicated ankle surgery on March 19. Repair tendons, put in artificial ligaments, and some other odds and ends. 12-week recovery period, 6 weeks in a boot, another 6 weeks with a brace. 12 days of not taking the boot off at all, then another 30 days of only taking it off to bathe. Yes, even sleeping with it on. We were not looking forward to the recovery period, but with any luck, by the end of it, she’d have been walking better than she has any time in the past 25 years or so.
They canceled all elective surgeries 'around here on March 16. (Yes, this was considered elective.)
If you sent me back to January 1, I’d have moved heaven and earth to move that timeline up by at least three days. She’d be just finished with the brace by now.
I’d also make sure the pantry and the chest freezer were as stocked up as they could be, and that we had alcohol, hand sanitizer, wipes, TP, paper towels, etc. in abundance, and all that stuff. But having that surgery canceled with three days to go, that was a real kick in the gut. And that ankle ain’t getting better by itself.
Take the trip to New Zealand I was planning. I was originally looking to leave in mid-March.
Sell all my stocks on Feb 19 and buy it all back on March 20.
Buy stock in Purell, Lysol, and Charmin.
Buy a bunch of face masks.