Help with Use of Time Machine

Hi All.
I am not having fun trying to recover mission critical data with Time Machine and I am wondering if I ever understood how this works.
I can only apparently go back by hitting the <- and -> arrows to "Today at 11:50 AM"??
I /can/ see the little sidebar lines go back to July 2011 but when the line gets fat clicking on it does not do anything.
I back up a 1 TB MacPro and a 250 GB MBP to a 2TB TC and I am wondering if I need to download some software - similar in ease of use to Omni Disk Sweeper - in order for me to get a handle on what is going on.
These files go back before Today at Noon and I am thinking it is a very good time for me to figure out if I actually know how to use this Time Machine/Capsule.
Thanks for any help and I have read Pondini's great stuff but if anyone can just verbally walk me through this a little I'd be greatful.
Thanks.

By <- and -> arrows, do you mean the oblique arrows between the Time Machine Finder window the the time line on the right?  It can take a long time for Time Machine to respond to clicks on those arrorws, particularly if you're connected to your Time Capsule via Wi-Fi.  Try giving it several minutes.
If that doesn't help, check back.  There's another way to retrieve files (as opposed to things like Mail messages) from Time Machine.
In the future, since your problem involves Time Machine, a message of this sort would be better posted in the section for your Mac OS X version.
By the way, you don't seem to have declared any of your system details in your profile.  Those can help people give you correct advice.  To update that, click on "My Stuff" near the top of a window on these discussion groups, then on "Profile".  Scroll down to "My Products" and either edit an existing one or add a new one.

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