Introduction

When I was a kid, I had a recurring daydream for many many years. It's completely theoretical and fanciful, but with some of my reality smashed in there for good measure.
So I imagined that I was an involuntary time traveler, that I was instantly POOFed into 1700s England. However I was dressed, or whatever I had on me at that moment was transported with me, but that was all I had.
How would I survive? How would the people treat me? Even though we spoke the same language, the dialect and meaning of the words would be different so communication wouldn't be easy. Would they take an immediate disliking to my "unusual" clothing?
Survival in such a theoretical situation would entirely depend on my mind, and the knowledge contained within it.
I live in an awesome age, with wonderful technologies. But I don't exactly understand them all. Would I be able to explain electricity to a scientist of the 1700s? What would I say about television, radio, telephones? If they wanted me to show them anything, could I actually build a telephone to show them how it works? And what about the materials that a telephone is made from? They wouldn't be available, so I'd have to make those too.
This led me to view my world from a new perspective. I was no longer content to take modern conveniences for granted. I wanted to know HOW everything worked, and how everything was made.
1700-era citizens knowledge of food preparation smokes mine by a mile. I buy my chicken like everyone else does today: at the grocery store. I've never killed or dressed a chicken nor would I know how if someone handed a chicken to me. I have little clue where my can of beloved corned beef hash came from or how it went into that can. I bought some peaches; it's not peach season so they were imported from somewhere but I don't know where, nor how many hands it passed to get to me.

So these daydreams, they affected my outlook on the world and shaped who I am. I blame those youthful daydreams for my gazillion hobbies and projects, each an attempt to figure out how my world is put together. Often times, I find myself reinventing the wheel. But the wheel needs reinventing sometimes when we forget how it was put together in the first place.

Someone out there has clearly had the same daydream as me. I nearly choked when I came across this one day:
I wish I knew who had created this awesome poster! Sounds like someone I'd have a really cool conversation with.