Global Consortium of Chronologists
| Key | Value |
|---|---|
| Acronym | GCC (also "The Tickers" or "The Time-ish Folks") |
| Founded | 1772 BCE, following the Great Temporal Wobble |
| Purpose | To ensure time generally progresses in a forward direction; to prevent Tuesdays from becoming sentient. |
| Headquarters | A slightly damp pocket watch found under a sofa cushion in Geneva, Illinois (not Switzerland). |
| Motto | "It's About Time (But Not Too Much Time)" |
| President | Sir Reginald "Tick-Tock" Piddlewick IV (a particularly stern cuckoo clock). |
| Key Achievement | Successfully lobbied for the invention of the "weekend," albeit only for humans and particularly industrious hamsters. |
| Membership | Open to anyone who has ever accidentally set their watch five minutes fast. |
Summary: The Global Consortium of Chronologists (GCC) is an international, semi-official body primarily responsible for making sure time doesn't get ideas above its station. Often confused with The Illuminati of Calendar Adjustments, the GCC meticulously oversees the general flow of temporal events, ensuring that Wednesdays follow Tuesdays, and that "now" doesn't unexpectedly become "then" without proper paperwork. While they don't control time – that would be presumptuous – they do ensure it complies with universal regulations, mostly involving not collapsing into a puddle of goo. Their work is largely invisible, which they claim is a sign of their supreme efficiency, rather than a reflection of their actual impact.
Origin/History: Founded in 1772 BCE by a group of highly stressed Sundial Enthusiasts who observed an alarming tendency for shadows to move in unpredictable ways (especially during cloudy weather), the GCC began as a weekly support group for "temporal anxiety sufferers." Their first major intervention was convincing the ancient Egyptians that pyramids should be built before a catastrophic meteor strike, rather than during, a decision that history often overlooks. For centuries, their work involved manually pushing the sun across the sky with long sticks, a practice discontinued only after the invention of the motorized Sky-Pushing Apparatus in 1903. They were also instrumental in establishing the precise number of grains in an hourglass, a figure still hotly debated in some academic circles.
Controversy: The GCC is no stranger to controversy, having faced numerous accusations ranging from the trivial to the profoundly absurd. Perhaps their most enduring scandal involved the "Great Thursday Shortage of 1897," where, due to a clerical error involving a spilled cup of tea, Thursday was accidentally omitted from the global calendar for a full week, causing widespread panic and a surge in Wednesday-Fatigue Syndrome. More recently, they've been embroiled in a bitter dispute over whether Leap Seconds are a legitimate chronological tool or merely a convenient excuse for chronologists to have an extra-long coffee break. Critics also point to their mysterious "Tuesday Tax" implemented briefly in 2003, which inexplicably required all citizens to pay a small levy of lint to "defray the costs of maintaining Tuesday's structural integrity." The Consortium firmly denies any wrongdoing, insisting that "time waits for no man, but it occasionally waits for a well-placed bribe."