Time travel for dummies. Am I right?

It happened again, and Tom The Tinkerer® was sick of it. For God’s sake, a grown-ass man should be able to take a nap without slipping through the time stream. Regardless, he dealt with it; he had to.

He took a deep breath and accessed where, and more importantly, when he was. The Manic Mechanic groaned involuntarily. He knew this time and place too well. It was 1989. The Quantum Physicist Straight Out Of Compton wanted to jump out the window and plunge to his death instead of reliving this moment. As welcoming as this plan was, he remembered the first rule of time travel: don’t fuck with it, otherwise, it will fuck with you harder. Yet, it remained, he did not want to revisit the fateful day that forever built the impenetrable fortress around his heart.

And then, as if on cue, Deidre Havenport, waltzed in like a catchy summer pop song. She was as beautiful as the first time he saw her. She smelled like the best pizza ever. She proclaimed, “Tom. It’s not you. It’s me, and I’m not into you anymore. Ta!” She curtsied and left as quickly and gracefully as she entered.

Tom wept uncontrollably, his sight blurring, turning everything into a very abstract painting. He returned to his present timeline and asked aloud, “The fuck?”