Is this because you don't like modals? What if we used URL rewrites so that modals changed to the correct URL for the post like Twitter does?
While I generally think that modals should be avoided on the web, this is not my main concern in this case...
... Clicking on the timestamp should link to something like "memos posted around this time", but that doesn't really make any sense.
I am okay with modals as long as they are small ones with yes/no buttons or something similar. Big ones belong to the desktop experience. :)
Thanks for the feedback :)