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Stavro Arrgolus's Blog
Topic: Editor's Blog- (11/4) I Think He Said, "The Sheriff Is Near"
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fiogf49gjkf0d November 4 - 1:30 pm
There. That's a better title for this entry now.
Not voting. Murderous back pain & long lines don't mix. Will be the first time in quite a while that I haven't. This is Massachusetts anyway- if there's anyplace that the outcome isn't in question, it's here. If Stalin were running, they'd vote for him.
I need to sit this one out. Last time around, the jury duty was vicious. Shortly after the last election, they hit me up for it twice inside of a month. One local, one federal. They wanted me to drive all the way across the state for the federal one. No. You have to be in good health to tackle traffic in a state where traffic lights, signs and cops directing traffic right in front of you are considered merely suggestions for how to drive and are all largely ignored. I need to go to Boston like I need another cancer operation. Screw that.
Going to follow doctor's orders and sit quietly and watch it all on CNN. Let the people who are actually fooled into thinking there'll be 'change' (not the first time someone's promised that) vote for whomever. News Flash: Both are still tools of the whims of their respective parties national committees who themselves are the puppets of larger special interests. Best thing to do is say hang the sense of it and start practicing your Mandarin- Wo ai zhong guo ren! Gonna need it in the not too distant future. Glad I won't live to see that day. I've read that there are more than 2¼ million in the Chinese army. How do you say "Don't shoot me!" and/or "Die, Commie pig!" in Cantonese? Hope all our old, rusty nuclear weapons are still working so we don't have to learn. Too cynical? Ok, uh, rubber hamsters, asphalt aardvarks..yeah.
"...We have to pick up a few results you may have missed. A little pink pussy-cat has taken Barrow-in-Furness. That's a gain from the Liberals there. Rastus Odinga Odinga has taken Wolverhampton Southwest, that's Enoch Powell's old constituency- an important gain there for 'Darkie Power'. Arthur Negus has held Bristols. That's not a result, that's just a piece of gossip. Sir Alec Douglas Home has taken Oldham for the Stone Dead party. A small piece of putty about that big, a cheese mechanic from Dunbar and two frogs- one called Kipper the other not- have all gone "Ni ni ni ni ni ni!" in Blackpool Central. And so it's beginning to look like a Silly landslide, and with the prospect of five more years' Silly government facing us we... Oh I don't want to do this any more, I'm bored!"
(Michael) Palin: He's right you know, it is a bloody waste of time.
Chapman: Absolute waste of time.
Palin: I wanted to be a gynecologist...
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October 30 - 5:15 pm
As of 5pm EDT, contest voting has ended and DevoSpice has won the Halloween contest with 25 votes. I'm noting it here right now...just in case. I've sent Wayne the message. This is his site; he can call it himself on the contest thread in the main forum.
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October 18 - 12:10 am
We quote them, we recite their bits...but we don't listen to them. Maybe because it's easy to have socialist views when you've made so much cash being a capitalist. Who's afraid of higher taxes when you're that rich? At any rate, time for an opinion from a somewhat familiar outsider on the election foolishness-
He even mentions the parrot thing. "Monty Python could have written this", he said. If they steal this election, as they have the last two, I'll be waiting for the 16 ton weight to fall on my head. They've done everything else to us. I'm an old cancer survivor too, but I should most certainly not be president. Besides, I'm a card carrying member of the Silly Party- ..uh, Independent- they'd never let me run. Maybe I could be editor of a website or something...
I'm wondering now if there'll be Halloween shows at all- much less a contest. Hope so. The 'seasonal membership increase' has already begun. +50 from last week and more and more visitors are viewing holiday song pages. If there aren't enough entries for it- or any, maybe the thing to do would be to blame the economy and move on to the Xmas contest. Give it plenty of time for new Xmas songs. Maybe if we get enough good songs and perhaps a little help from The FuMP with this, there could be a downloadable Xmas album in the store before too long.
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October 10 - 6:45 pm
Didn't even have to change the blog title from that Firesign Theatre reference I was using for this entry.
Today, I've been dealing with "the mouse problem"- and not the kind in the Python bit Pete and I were doing a while back either. I mean the genuine article. Imagine having to dismantle the engine cover of your mower every time you want to mow because it's always infested with mouse nests. Or having to keep your clothes in a secure part of the house..out of the way of where mice can chew them apart to build nests in your mower with. All part of living in the country, you say? Bollocks, I say! Bollocks!
It's not enough that my house is falling apart and needs pricey repairs- oh, no- it's got to be infested with mice, too. It's done nothing but rain this year and so there's been a mouse explosion. And not the good kind where the little bastards' heads fly apart in a geyser of blood, either. The last time it was this bad was in the winter of 1972. How did I deal with it then? Some things don't have to change. Time to reload the mouse drowner.
Mouse Drowner - or "The Direct Approach"
If your house resembles the Python bit where rodents are climbing the walls and John Cleese (as Beethoven) is screaming at them to 'get out the bloody piano, you stupid, furry, bucktoothed gits!', it's time to get 'all old school & medieval' on their furry asses.
Get one of those 5 gallon plastic buckets, fill it with 6 in. of water, then punch a small hole through the middle of a beer can and run a long piece of wire through it and suspend the can over the middle of the bucket, securing the ends of the wire to the holes in the sides that the handle attaches to. Slather the ends of the can with peanut butter and put the contraption where the mouse infestation is, making sure to put a board or something on the side to give the little bastards access to the can. When they jump for the can suspended above the water, the can will revolve on the wire and dump them in the drink. That'll teach the miserable little f*ckers to chew holes in my shirts and build nests in my mower.
Never thought I'd be quoting the new Dr. Who series... "When I was young, I used to have so much mercy..." I know PETA would disapprove, but screw it. Shirts and socks are expensive and I can't have mice using their eaten remnants for bedding now, can I?
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October 7 - 1 am
Big doings. The last vestiges of the Russian script injection attack have been wiped yesterday (or so we thought- see below) and the damaged lyrics & blogs are repaired. The problems with the whole 'editing access thing' are being worked out, too. Maybe in the not too distant future, I'll be able to fix all the crap that requires fixing without having to send Wayne an error list every few weeks. At least not big ones, anyway.
The Halloween contest is on. It'd be helpful to us if you participate as it helps generate new membership for the site. Even now on the guest page, visitors are looking for Holiday dementia. The contests will help bring it to them in a more direct way than just playing decades old recordings on shows, though traditions have their place in all this also.
I still think getting together with The FuMP and making an Xmas recording sellable on both sites is a good idea. Gotta start working out the details now if it's to be done in time.
- 10 am
Just when you thought the site was safe from attack script... I was looking through the Xmas shows and found this script in the show comments- www.themadmusicarchive.com/playlist.aspx?Show=MMS-57 Found it in many show comments in the shows surrounding it as well. I hope this crap is left over from the Dec. 28 attack and not something new.
- 11 am
Looks like there's another exploit to stuff prescription drug ad script into. Wayne knows about it now and is working to foil this latest Commie attempt to spoil our fun.
- 1:15 pm
After some lunch and another look around, it seems the fix has worked. There's the odd backslash in the middle of words here and there, but things look good otherwise. Now the focus can return to the Halloween contest...I hope.
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Member Comments:
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fiogf49gjkf0d Yes, they can't seem to get enough of that 'special day'. 1.3 billion Chinese can't be wong..er, wrong. Whop!
"What was that? This is not a chawade! We wequire totow concentwation!"
Any excuse for yet another KFM reference...
Bob Guest:
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I understand there was quite a run on the U.S. border today of potential Chinese immigrants. Something about having an erection.
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fiogf49gjkf0d I understand there was quite a run on the U.S. border today of potential Chinese immigrants. Something about having an erection.
Stavro Arrgolus:
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.....Best thing to do is say hang the sense of it and start practicing your Mandarin- Wo ai zhong guo ren! Gonna need it in the not too distant future. Glad I won't live to see that day. I've read that there are more than 2¼ million in the Chinese army. How do you say "Don't shoot me!" and/or "Die, Commie pig!" in Cantonese? Hope all our old, rusty nuclear weapons are still working so we don't have to learn. Too cynical? Ok, uh, rubber hamsters, asphalt aardvarks..yeah.
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fiogf49gjkf0d Well, they got the idea. In the book, part of the next sequence goes like this:
"Far back in the mists of ancient time, in the great and glorious days of the former Galactic Empire, life was wild, rich and largely tax-free. Mighty starships plied their way between exotic suns, seeking adventure and reward among the farthest reaches of Galactic space. In those days spirits were brave, the stakes were high, men were real men, women were real women and small furry creatures from Alpha Centauri were real small furry creatures from Alpha Centauri. And all dared to brave unknown terrors, to do mighty deeds, to boldly split infinitives that no man had split before -- and thus was the Empire forged.
Many men of course became extremely rich, but this was perfectly natural and nothing to be ashamed of because no one was really poor- at least no one worth speaking of. And for all the richest and most successful merchants, life inevitably became rather dull and niggly and they began to imagine that this was therefore the fault of the worlds they'd settled on. None of them was entirely satisfactory: either the climate wasn't quite right in the later part of the afternoon or the day was half an hour too long or the sea was exactly the wrong shade of pink.
And thus were created the conditions for a staggering new form of industry: custom-made luxury planet building. The home of this industry was the planet Magrathea, where hyperspatial engineers sucked matter through white holes in space to form it into dream planets -- gold planets, platinum planets, soft rubber planets with lots of earthquakes -- all lovingly made to meet the exacting standards that the Galaxy's richest men naturally came to expect.
But so successful was this venture that Magrathea itself soon became the richest planet of all time and the rest of the Galaxy was reduced to abject poverty. And so the system broke down, the Empire collapsed, and a long sullen silence settled over a billion hungry worlds disturbed only by the pen scratchings of scholars as they labored into the night over smug little treatises on the value of a planned political economy.
Magrathea itself disappeared and its memory soon passed into the obscurity of legend.
In these enlightened days, of course, no one believes a word of it."
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fiogf49gjkf0d [Arthur Dent] Ford, you mean you know this person ... s?
[Ford Prefect] Know him? He's my ... Oh, hey, Zaphod. I'd like you to meet a great friend of mine, Arthur Dent. I saved him when his planet blew up.
[Zaphod] Sure. Hi, Arthur. Glad you could make it.
[Ford Prefect] And Arthur, this is ...
[Arthur Dent] We've met!
[Ford Prefect] What?
[Zaphod] Oh, er, have we? Hey!
[Ford Prefect] What do you mean -- met? This is Zaphod Beeblebrox from Betelgeuse 5, you know, not bloody Martin Smith from Croydon.
[Arthur Dent] I don't care. We've met, haven't we, Zaphod? Or should I say .... Phil?
[Zaphod] What?
[Arthur Dent] At a party six months ago.
[Zaphod] Hey, I really doubt that, you know.
[Arthur Dent] On Earth, England, London, Islington.
[Zaphod] Oh, hey, yeah! That party?
[Ford Prefect] What? You mean you've been to that miserable little planet as well?
[Zaphod] I may have dropped in, you know, on my way somewhere.
[Arthur Dent] At this party was a girl I was after. Beautiful, charming, devastatingly intelligent, everything I'd been saving myself up for. Along comes your friend and says, "Hey, doll! Is this guy boring you? Why don't you come and talk to me? I'm from a different planet."
[Ford Prefect] Zaphod?
[Arthur Dent] Well, of course, he only had the two arms and one head, and called himself Phil ...
[Trillian] But you must admit, he did turn out to be from another planet!
[Arthur Dent] Good heavens! Tricia McMillan!
[Trillian] Trillian to you.
[Computer] Infinity minus 1. Improbability sum now complete. For my next trick ...
[Zaphod] Shut up!
[Arthur Dent] What are you doing here?
[Trillian] Same as you. I hitched a lift. After all, with a degree in maths and another in astrophysics, it was either that or back to the dole cue on Monday.
[Zaphod] Oh, God! Ford, this is Trillilan. Hi! Trillian, my semi-cousin, Ford, who shares three of the same mothers as me. Is this sort of thing going to happen every time we use the Infinite Improbabililty Drive?
[Trillian] Very probably, I'm afraid.
[Zaphod] Zaphod Beeblebrox, this is a very large drink. Hi.
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It appears we have come to the end of the script as supplied by that link. I'd continue by quoting the book, but my copies of it are still packed in a storage unit and I have almost two weeks before I move into my house.
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fiogf49gjkf0d [Zaphod] Shut up and work something out for me, will you?
[Computer] A probability forecast based on ...
[Zaphod] Improbability data, yeah ...
[Computer] OK. Did you know that most people's lives are governed by telephone numbers?
[Trillian] Telephone numbers?
[Marvin] I've got this terrible pain in all the diodes down my left side.
[Arthur Dent] Really?
[Marvin] Oh, yes. I mean, I've asked for them to be replaced, but no one ever listens.
[Arthur Dent] Uh, I can imagine.
[Ford Prefect] Well, well, well, Zaphod Beeblebrox!
[Zaphod] I don't believe it! This is just too amazing! Trillian! Trillian? Oh, this is going to be great! I'm going to be so amazingly cool it would fluster a Vegan snow lizard! What real cool! Several million points out of ten for style! Right, now which is the most nonchalant chair to be discovered in?
[Door] Glad to be of service.
[Marvin] I suppose you'll want to see the aliens now. Do you want me to sit in a corner and rust or just fall apart where I'm standing?
[Zaphod] Show them in, please, Marvin.
[Door] Thank you.
[Zaphod] Ford, hi. How are you? Glad you could drop in.
(Ford refuses to be out-cooled)
[Ford Prefect] Oh, hi, Zaphod, great to see you. You're looking well. The extra arm suits you. Hey, this is a great ship you've stolen.
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I'll just be content if they tie up the loose ends. And if they could get rid of all the crap CGI and bring back the old ship design and lose the boxy look the computers made- who thought that was an improvement?!
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fiogf49gjkf0d [Trillian] I just thought of something.
[Zaphod] Yeah, worth interrupting a news bulletin about me for?
[Trillian] Look, can we leave your ego out of this? This is important.
[Zaphod] If there's anything more important than my ego around here, I want it caught and shot now!
[Trillian] Listen, we picked up those couple of guys ...
[Zaphod] Hey, what couple of guys?
[Trillian] The couple of guys we picked up!
[Zaphod] Oh, yeah. Those couple of guys.
[Trillian] We picked them up in Sector ZZ9 Plural Z Alpha.
[Zaphod] Yeah!
[Trillian] Does that mean anything to you?
[Zaphod] Sector ZZ9 Plural Z Alpha!
[Trillian] Well?
[Zaphod] Yeah, what does the Z mean?
[Trillian] Which one?
[Zaphod] Any one.
[Trillian] Look, would you mind looking at the Galactic charts?
[Zaphod] Hey, that's wild! I mean, how did we come to be there? We should have zapped right into the middle of the Horsehead Nebula and that is nowhere!
[Trillian] The Improbability Drive. We pass through every point in the Universe! You know that!
[Zaphod] Yeah, but like actually picking those dudes up there is just too wild a coincidence. I want to work this out. Hey, Computer!
[Computer] Hi, there. Whatever your problem, I am here to help you solve it. All I want to do is make your day more and more bearable.
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fiogf49gjkf0d I do have the TV version on DVD.... And speaking of Red Dwarf, I hear they are finally going to tie up their cliffhanger and produce a couple TV specials. It's no Hollywood movie, but at least it's something.
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fiogf49gjkf0d There are torrents of it everywhere and the DVDs must still be findable. I still have it on tape though I don't know what condition that's in now. It's much funnier- even with the crap FX and the old Dr. Who and Blake's 7 sets. I still remember the distinctive 'book segment' animations and the strange electronic sounding music which wasn't really new wave or new age. This was how it was all supposed to be. No villains to defeat or love stories to distract from the general silliness and definitely no dumbing everything down so the lowest common denominator could 'get it'.
It's all basically the inspiration for Red Dwarf. Just guys out there experiencing "excitement and adventure and really wild things" -in space.
MarlinsGirl:
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I have not seen the TV version. Regarding Zaphod I thought it was really creative how they did his second head.
Terri M.
Bob Guest:
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I found the film version (when compared to the TV version) to be a huge disappointment. Mainly because of Zaphod's second head. On the TV version it was obvious that it was just a paper mache prop wired poorly to his shoulder, but at least they tried. I expected the film version to at least try to do some animatronics or computer generated animation.... but nooo.... Instead they do some stupid flip your hair back to reveal the other head while the original hides away thing.
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fiogf49gjkf0d I have not seen the TV version. Regarding Zaphod I thought it was really creative how they did his second head.
Terri M.
Bob Guest:
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I found the film version (when compared to the TV version) to be a huge disappointment. Mainly because of Zaphod's second head. On the TV version it was obvious that it was just a paper mache prop wired poorly to his shoulder, but at least they tried. I expected the film version to at least try to do some animatronics or computer generated animation.... but nooo.... Instead they do some stupid flip your hair back to reveal the other head while the original hides away thing.
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fiogf49gjkf0d [Marvin] "Stolen"?
[Ford Prefect] Who by?
[Marvin] Zaphod Beeblebrox.
[Ford Prefect] Zaphod Beebelbrox?!
[Marvin] Sorry, did I say something wrong? Pardon me for breathing, which I never do anyway, so I don't know why I bother to say it. Oh, God, I'm so depressed! Here's another of those self-satisfied doors! Life! Don't talk to me about life!
[Arthur Dent] No one even mentioned it!
[Door] Glad to be of service.
[Ford Prefect] Really, Zaphod Beeblebrox!
[TV] Reports brought to you here on the sub-etha waveband, broadcasting around the Galaxy, around the clock. We'll be saying a big hello to all intelligent lifeforms everywhere. And to everyone else out there, the secret is to bang the rocks together, guys. And of course, the big news story tonight is the sensational theft of the Improbability prototype ship, by none other than Zaphod Beelbebrox. And the question everyone's asking is has the big Zee finally flipped? Beeblebrox, the man who invented the Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster, ex-confidence trickster, part-time Galactic President, once described by Eccentrica Gallumbits, the triple-breasted whore of Eroticon 6, as "The best bang since the big one," and recently voted the worst-dressed sentient being in the Universe for the seventh time running. Has he got an answer this time? We asked his private brain care specialist Gag Halfrunt.
[Gag Halfrunt] Well, look. Zaphod's just zis guy, you know.
[TV] Beeblebrox stole the Improbability Drive Ship when he was in fact meant to be launching it.
(Trillian turns off the news report)
[Zaphod] Hey, kid, what'd you do that for?
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fiogf49gjkf0d The film' FX were good, but I agree about it being disappointing. For me, it was about the Americanization of it. They just had to add a villain, a 'love interest' and all the other hackneyed, low rent crap that studios think people will avoid a movie without. Fanboys would have thought it to be a classic had they just let the story be, but the desire to placate the 14 year old girls who their marketing people claim buy all the tickets was just too overwhelming. That's why movies are crap and I just don't go to them anymore.
Personally, I don't think there's any author who can recreate the writing style and feel of Douglas Adams' work, but I, too, will be happy to buy the new book if someone manages to get it right.
Bob Guest:
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I hear there is another author who is picking up where Douglas Adams left off on the Hitchhiker series. Hard to say now if it will be as good, but I'm willing to give it a try.
I found the film version (when compared to the TV version) to be a huge disappointment. Mainly because of Zaphod's second head. On the TV version it was obvious that it was just a paper mache prop wired poorly to his shoulder, but at least they tried. I expected the film version to at least try to do some animatronics or computer generated animation.... but nooo.... Instead they do some stupid flip your hair back to reveal the other head while the original hides away thing.
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fiogf49gjkf0d [Marvin] It is.
[Ford Prefect] What?
[Marvin] It all is. Absolutely ghastly. Just don't even talk about it. Look at this door. All the doors in this spacecraft have a cheerful and sunny disposition. It is their pleasure to open for you and their satisfaction to close again with the knowledge of a job well done.
[Door] Glad to be of service.
[Marvin] Hateful, isn't it? Come on. I've been ordered to take you up to the bridge. Here I am, brain the size of a planet, and they tell me to take you up to the bridge. Call that job satisfaction? 'Cause I don't!
[Ford Prefect] Uh, hey, excuse me, which government owns this ship?
[Marvin] You watch this door. It's about to open again. I can tell by the intolerable air of smugness it suddenly generates.
[Door] Please enjoy your trip through this door!
[Marvin] Come on.
[Door] Thank you!
[Marvin] Thank you very much the Marketing Division of the Sirius Cybernetics Corporation!
[Ford Prefect] Excuse me, which government ...?
[Marvin] Let's build robots with Genuine People Personalities," they said, so they tried it out with me. I'm a personality prototype. You can tell, can't you?
[Ford Prefect] Which govern ...?
[Marvin] I hate that door. I'm not getting you down, am I?
[Ford Prefect] Which governments owns this ...?
[Marvin] No government owns it. It's been stolen.
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fiogf49gjkf0d I hear there is another author who is picking up where Douglas Adams left off on the Hitchhiker series. Hard to say now if it will be as good, but I'm willing to give it a try.
I found the film version (when compared to the TV version) to be a huge disappointment. Mainly because of Zaphod's second head. On the TV version it was obvious that it was just a paper mache prop wired poorly to his shoulder, but at least they tried. I expected the film version to at least try to do some animatronics or computer generated animation.... but nooo.... Instead they do some stupid flip your hair back to reveal the other head while the original hides away thing.
Stavro Arrgolus:
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Actually, there are numerous versions of HHGttG. What you see here is the TV version from 1981. There's also the original radio version which predates this, the book series and the Hollywoodized movie version from a few years ago. All 5 books were rehashed for radio and run on Radio 4 a while back if I remember correctly- with a happier ending this time.
Then there are the 2 Dirk Gently books- The 1st is a rethink of the Dr. Who story, "Shada" that he wrote which was never finished because of a strike at the BBC. The second is a story about Norse mythology- and the "interconnectedness of all things", of course.
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fiogf49gjkf0d [Ford Prefect] I think this ship is brand new, Arthur.
[Arthur Dent] Why, have you got some exotic device for measuring the age of metal?
[Ford Prefect] No. I just found this sales brochure on the floor. It says, "The Universe can be yours for a mere five quilliard Altairian dollars."
[Arthur Dent] Cheap?
[Ford Prefect] A quilliard is a whole page full of noughts with a one at the beginning. Ah, listen, this is what I was after! "Sensational new breakthrough in improbability physics. As the ship's drive reaches Infinite Improbability, it passes simultaneously through every point in the Universe. Be the envy of other major governments." I mean, wow! This is really big league stuff.
[Arthur Dent] Well, it's a whole lot better than that dingy Vogon crate! This is my idea of a spaceship, all gleaming metal, flashing lights, everything. Oh! I wonder what will happen if I press this button?
[Ford Prefect] Don't!
(BEEP!)
[Arthur Dent] Oh!
[Ford Prefect] What happened?
[Arthur Dent] A sign lit up saying, "Please do not press this button again."
[Ford Prefect] They make a big thing of the ship's cybernetics. A new generation of Sirius Cybernetics Corporation computers and robots with the new GPP feature.
[Arthur Dent] GPP? What's that?
[Ford Prefect] Uh, it says, Genuine People Personalities.
[Arthur Dent] Sounds ghastly.
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fiogf49gjkf0d [Trillian] No, don't you worry about that. You just act as comes naturally and everything will be fine.
[Marvin] You're sure you don't mind?
[Zaphod] No, it's just all part of life.
[Marvin] Life! Don't talk to me about life!
[Trillian] I don't think I can stand that robot much longer, Zaphod.
[Narrator] The Encyclopaedia Galactica defines a robot as a mechanical apparatus designed to do the work of a man. The Marketing Division of the Sirius Cybernetics Corporation defines a robot as: your plastic pal who's fun to be with!
The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy defines the Marketing Division of the Sirius Cybernetics Corporation as a bunch of mindless jerks who'll be the first against the wall when the revolution comes. With a footnote to the effect that the editors would welcome applications for anyone interested in taking over the post of robotics correspondent. Curiously enough, an edition of the Encyclopaedia Galactica that fell through a time warp from 1,000 years in the future defines the Marketing Division of the Sirius Cybnernetics Corporation as "A bunch of mindless jerks who were the first against the wall when the revolution came."
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fiogf49gjkf0d Actually, there are numerous versions of HHGttG. What you see here is the TV version from 1981. There's also the original radio version which predates this, the book series and the Hollywoodized movie version from a few years ago. All 5 books were rehashed for radio and run on Radio 4 a while back if I remember correctly- with a happier ending this time.
Then there are the 2 Dirk Gently books- The 1st is a rethink of the Dr. Who story, "Shada" that he wrote which was never finished because of a strike at the BBC. The second is a story about Norse mythology- and the "interconnectedness of all things", of course.
MarlinsGirl:
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Ah, Ok. While the Captain is away, we all get treated to the screenplay of HHG2TG.
Tim P. Ryan:
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Another training class with long commute this week. Makes it hard to take little bits of office time to keep up.
MarlinsGirl:
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I wonder what Captain Wayne is doing.
Terri M.
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fiogf49gjkf0d Ah, Ok. While the Captain is away, we all get treated to the screenplay of HHG2TG.
Tim P. Ryan:
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Another training class with long commute this week. Makes it hard to take little bits of office time to keep up.
MarlinsGirl:
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I wonder what Captain Wayne is doing.
Terri M.
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fiogf49gjkf0d [Trillian] We picked them up while we were in Infinite Improbability Drive.
[Zaphod] But that's incredible!
[Trillian] No, just very, very improbable. Look, don't worry about the aliens. They are just a couple of guys, I expect. I'll send the robot down to check them out. Hey, Marvin?
[Marvin] I think you ought to know I'm feeling very depressed.
[Zaphod] Oh, God!
[Trillian] Here's something to occupy you and take your mind off things.
[Marvin] It won't work. I have an exceptionally large mind.
[Trillian] Marvin!
[Marvin] All right. What do you want me to do?
[Trillian] Go down to number 3 entry bay and bring the two aliens up here under surveillance.
[Marvin] Just that?
[Trillian] Yes.
[Marvin] I won't enjoy it.
[Zaphod] She's not asking you to enjoy it, just do it, will you?
[Marvin] All right! I'll do it.
[Zaphod] Oh, good, good, great. Thank you.
[Marvin] I'm not getting you down at all, am I?
[Trillian] No, no, Marvin, that's just fine, really.
[Marvin] I wouldn't like to think I was getting you down.
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fiogf49gjkf0d [Trillian] 5 to 1 against and falling. 4 to 1 against and falling. 3 to 1, 2 ...1. Probability factor of 1 to 1. We have normality. I repeat -- we have normality. Anything you still can't cope with is, therefore, your own problem.
[Zaphod] Who are they, Trillian?
[Trillian] Oh just a couple of guys we picked up in open space. Sector ZZ9 Plural Z Alpha.
[Zaphod] Yeah, well that's a very sweet thought, Trillian, but do you really think it's wise right now? I mean, here we are on the run and everything, we've got the police of half the Galaxy after us, and we stop to pick up hitchhikers. Yeah, okay,, 10 out of 10 for style, but minus several million for good thinking, huh?
[Trillian] They were floating unprotected in open space. You didn't want them to die, did you?
[Zaphod] Well, no, not as such, but you know.
[Trillian] A second later and they'd have been dead.
[Zaphod] So if you'd taken the trouble to think about it a moment longer, it would've gone away, right?
[Trillian] Anyway, I didn't pick them up. The ship did -- all by itself.
[Zaphod] Hey, what?
[B2] Hey, what?
[Zaphod] The ship picked them up by itself.
[B2] So what?
[Zaphod] The ship ... Oh, forget it and go back to sleep!
[B2] Heyyyyy.
(BLEEPING)
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fiogf49gjkf0d Another training class with long commute this week. Makes it hard to take little bits of office time to keep up.
MarlinsGirl:
---
I wonder what Captain Wayne is doing.
Terri M.
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fiogf49gjkf0d I wonder what Captain Wayne is doing.
Terri M.
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fiogf49gjkf0d [Ford Prefect] Arthur, this is fantastic! We've been picked up by a ship with the new infinite Improbability Drive! This is incredible, Arthur!
(WHOOPING)
[Ford Prefect] Arthur? What's happening?
[Arthur Dent] Ford, there's an infinite number of monkeys out here who want to talk to us about this script for Hamlet they've worked out.
[Narrator] The Infinite Improbability Drive is a wonderful new method of crossing interstellar distances in a few seconds, without all that tedious mucking about in hyperspace. The principle of generating small amounts of finite improbability, by simply hooking the logic circuits of a Bambleweeny 57 Sub-Meson Brain to an atomic vector plotter suspended in a Brownian Motion producer - say, a nice hot cup of tea - had long been understood, and such generators were often used to break the ice at parties by making all the molecules in the hostess's undergarments simultaneously leap one foot to the left, in accordance with the theory of indeterminacy. Many respectable physicists said that they weren't going to stand for such a thing, partly because it was a debasement of science, but mostly because they didn't get invited to those sort of parties. Another thing they couldn't stand was the perpetual failure they encountered in trying to construct a machine which could generate the Infinite Improbability field needed to flip a spaceship between the furthest stars and, in the end, they grumpily announced that such a machine was virtually impossible.
And then, one evening, a student, who had been left to sweep up the lab after a particularly unsuccessful party, found himself reasoning this way: "If such a machine is a virtual impossibility, then it must, logically, be a finite improbability. So all I have to do in order to make one is to work out exactly how improbable it is, feed that figure into the finite improbability generator, give it a fresh cup of really hot tea and turn it on." The moment he did this, he was rather startled to discover that he had managed to create the long sought-after Infinite Improbability Generator out of thin air. It startled him even more when, just after he was awarded the Galactic Institute's prize for extreme cleverness, he got lynched by a rampaging mob of respectable physicists who had finally realized that the one thing they really couldn't stand was a smartass.
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fiogf49gjkf0d [Trillian] 2 to the power of 100,000 to 1 against and falling.
[Arthur Dent] What's that?
[Ford Prefect] I don't know. It sounded like a measurement of probability.
[Arthur Dent] What does it mean?
[Ford Prefect] I don't know. But I definitely think we're on some kind of spaceship.
[Arthur Dent] Then, I can only assume we're not in the first-class compartment! Southend seems to be melting away. The stars are swirling ... a dustbowl ... snow ... My leg's drifting off into the sunset. My left arm's disappeared! How am I going to operate my digital watch now?
(ECHOING)
[Arthur Dent] Ford, you're turning into a penguin! Stop it!
[Ford Prefect] Qu -- what?
[Trillian] 2 to the power of 75,000 to 1 against and falling ...
[Ford Prefect] Hey! Who are you? Where are you? What's going on? And is there any way of stopping it?
[Trillian] Please relax. You are perfectly safe.
[Ford Prefect] That is not the point! The point is that I am now a perfectly safe penguin, and my colleague is rapidly running out of limbs. Isn't there anything you feel you ought to be telling us?
[Trillian] Welcome to the starship Heart of Gold. Please do not be alarmed by anything you see or hear around you. You are bound to feel some initial ill effects as you have been rescued from certain death at an improbability level of 2 to the power of 260,199 to 1 against, possibly much higher. We are now cruising at a level of 2 to the power of 25,000 to 1 against and falling, and we will be restoring normality as soon as we are sure what is normal anyway. Thank you. 2 to the power ...
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fiogf49gjkf0d [Zaphod] Is this guy bothering you?
[Narrator] Though the planet Earth, the Islington flat, and the telephone have all now been demolished, it's comforting to reflect that they are all in some small way commemorated by the fact that some 29 seconds later, Arthur and Ford were, in fact, rescued.
[Ford Prefect] See, I told you I'd think of something.
[Arthur Dent] Oh, sure!
[Ford Prefect] Bright idea of mine to find a passing spaceship and get rescued by it.
[Arthur Dent] Oh, come on! The chances against it were astronomical.
[Ford Prefect] Don't knock it, It worked. Where the hell are we?
[Arthur Dent] Well, I hardly like to say this, but it looks like the seafront at Southend.
[Ford Prefect] God, I'm relieved to hear you say that!
[Arthur Dent] Why?
[Ford Prefect] I thought I must be going mad!
[Arthur Dent] Perhaps you are. Perhaps you only thought I said it.
[Ford Prefect] Well, did you or didn't you?
[Arthur Dent] I think so.
[Ford Prefect] Perhaps we're both going mad.
[Arthur Dent] Nice day for it -- sun ...
[Ford Prefect] Sea ...
[Arthur Dent] You know, if this is Southend, there's something very odd about it.
[Ford Prefect] What? You mean the way the sea stays steady as a rock and the buildings keep washing up and down? I thought that was odd.
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fiogf49gjkf0d [Arthur Dent] So that's it? We're going to die?
[Ford Prefect] Yeah. Except ... no! Wait a minute! What's this switch?
[Arthur Dent] What? Where?
[Ford Prefect] No, I was only fooling. We're going to die after all.
[Arthur Dent] You know, it's at times like this, when I'm stuck in a Vogon airlock with a man from Betelgeuse about to die of asphyxiation in deep space, that I really wish I'd listened to what my mother told me when I was young.
[Ford Prefect] Why? What did she tell you?
[Arthur Dent] I don't know ... I didn't listen.
[Ford Prefect] Terrific.
[WHOOSH!]
[Vogon Captain] "Counterpoint the surrealism of the underlying metaphor"! Huh! Death's too good for them!
[Narrator] The Hitchhiker's Guide To the Galaxy is a wholly remarkable book. The introduction starts like this: Space, it says, is big. Really big. You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it's a long way down the street to the chemist, but that's just peanuts to space. Listen ... it's just so big that by comparison, bigness itself looks ... and so on.
After a while, the style settles down a bit, and it starts telling you things you actually need to know, like the fact that the fabulously beautiful planet of Bethselamin is now so worried about the cumulative erosion caused by over 10 billion visiting tourists a year that any net imbalance between the amount you eat and the amount you excrete whilst on the planet is surgically removed from your body weight when you leave.
(SCREAMING)
So every time you go to the lavatory there, it's vitally important to get a receipt.
In the entry in which it talks about dying of asphyxiation 30 seconds after being thrown out of a spaceship, it goes on to say that space being the size it is, the chances of being picked up by another craft within those seconds are two to the power of two hundred and sixty thousand, one hundred and ninety-nine to one against which, by a staggering coincidence, was also the phone number of an Islington flat where Arthur once went to a a very good party, where he ate some very good food, had some very good drinks with some very good friends and met a very nice girl whom he totally failed to get off with.
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fiogf49gjkf0d [Ford Prefect] But come on now, look!
[Arthur Dent] Ow! Stop that!
[Ford Prefect] Hang on! There's music and art and things to tell you about yet!
[Vogon Guard] I think I better just stick to what I know, thanks, but thanks for taking an interest.
[Arthur Dent] I've got a headache! I don't want to go to heaven with a headache! I'll be all cross and I won't enjoy it.
[Ford Prefect] Look. There's a whole world you know nothing about. Now listen. How about this ...? (he hums Beethoven's Fifth) Doesn't that stir anything in you?
[Vogon Guard] ...No. Bye. I'll tell my aunt what you said.
[CLANG!]
[Ford Prefect] Potentially bright lad, I thought.
[Vogon Guard] (He hums Beethoven's Fifth) Nah!
[Arthur Dent] We're trapped now, aren't we?
[Ford Prefect] Yeah, we're trapped.
[Arthur Dent] Well, didn't you think of anything?
[Ford Prefect] Yeah.
[Arthur Dent] What?
[Ford Prefect] Unfortunately, it involved being on the other side of this hatchway.
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fiogf49gjkf0d [Vogon Guard] And shouting ...
[Ford Prefect] Yeah, and shouting! Yeah! And he doesn't even know why he's doing it.
[Arthur Dent] Oh, poignant, very poignant!
[Vogon Guard] Oh, put it like that ...
[Ford Prefect] Good lad.
[Vogon Guard] All right, but what's the alternative?
[Ford Prefect] Well, stop doing it of course! Tell them you're not going to do it any more. Stand up to them!
[Vogon Guard] Doesn't sound that great to me!
[Ford Prefect] Oh, but that's just the start. There's more to it than that, you see ...
[Vogon Guard] No, if it's all the same to you, I think I'll just get you two shoved out, and then get on with some other piece of shouting I've got to do. RESISTANCE IS USELESS!
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fiogf49gjkf0d [Ford Prefect] Aw, give it a rest! Do you enjoy this sort of thing?
[Vogon Guard] What? What do you mean?
[Ford Prefect] I mean, does it give you a full, satisfying life?
[Vogon Guard] Full, satisfying life?
[Ford Prefect] Yeah, stomping around, shouting, pushing people off spaceships.
[Vogon Guard] Well, the hours are good!
[Ford Prefect] They'd have to be!
[Arthur Dent] Ford, what are you doing?
[Ford Prefect] Shh! So, the hours are good, are they?
[Vogon Guard] Yeah. But now you come to mention it, most of the actual minutes are pretty lousy. Except some of the shouting I quite like. RESISTANCE ... !
[Ford Prefect] Sure, yes, you're good at that, I can tell. But if the rest of it is so lousy, why do you do it? The girls? The rubber? The machismo?
[Vogon Guard] Oh, I don't know, really. I think I just sort of ... do it. You see, my aunt said that spaceship guard was a good career for a young Vogon, you know, the uniform, the low-slung stun-ray holster, the mindless tedium.
[Arthur Dent] Ford, this guy's half-throttling me!
[Ford Prefect] Yeah, but try and understand his problem. Here he is, poor guy, his entire life is spent stamping around, pushing people off spaceships ...
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fiogf49gjkf0d [Ford Prefect[ Into whatever the poem was about. That was very good.
[Vogon Captain] So, what you are saying is that I just write poetry because underneath my mean and callous, heartless exterior, I just want to be loved, is that it?
[Ford Prefect] Well, I mean, yes, don't we all, deep down, underneath, you know?
[Vogon Captain] No! You're completely wrong. I write poetry just to throw my mean, callous, heartless exterior into sharp relief. I'm going to throw you off the ship anyway. Guard! Take the prisoners to number 3 airlock and throw them out.
[Ford Prefect] This is great! This is really terrific!
[Arthur Dent] Ow! Let go of me, you brute!
[Ford Prefect] Don't worry -- I'll think of something.
[Vogon Guard] Resistance is useless!
[Arthur Dent] What is all this, Ford? I woke up this morning, thought I'd have a nice, relaxed day, do a bit of reading, brush the dog. It's just now after 4:00 in the afternoon, and I'm already being thrown out of an alien spaceship five light years from the smoking remains of the Earth.
[Ford Prefect] Alright, just stop panicking!
[Arthur Dent] Who said anything about panicking? This is just culture shock! Wait till I've settled down and found my bearings! Then I'll start panicking!
[Ford Prefect] Arthur, you're getting hysterical! Shut up!
[Vogon Guard] Resistance is useless!
[Ford Prefect] And you!
[Vogon Guard] Resistance is useless!
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fiogf49gjkf0d (AGONIZED MOANING)
[Vogon Captain] Now the jurpling slayjid agrocrustles
Are slurping hagrilly up the axlegrurts
And living glupules frart and slipulate
Like jowling meated liverslime.
Groop I implore thee
My frooting turlingdromes
And hooptiously bedrangle me with crinkly bindlewurdles
Or else I shall rend thee in the gobberwarts with my blurglecruncheon
See if I don't!
So, Earthlings ...
[Ford Prefect] I'm not an Earthling.
[Vogon Captain] Quiet! I present you with a simple choice. Think very carefully, for your very lives lie in your hands. Now choose! Either die in the vacuum of space...or tell me how good you thought my poem was.
[Arthur Dent] I liked it.
[Ford Prefect] Huh?
[Arthur Dent] Oh, yes. I thought some of the metaphysical imagery was really particularly effective.
[Vogon Captain] Yes?
[Arthur Dent] Oh, and interesting ... rhythmic devices ... which seemed to counterpoint the, er ...
[Ford Prefect] Counterpoint the surrealism of the underlying metaphor of the, er ...
[Arthur Dent] The Humanity ...
[Ford Prefect] Vogonity ...
[Arthur Dent] Vogonity, sorry...of the poet's compassionate soul, which strives through the medium of the verse structure to sublimate this, transcend that, and come to terms with the fundamental dichotomies of the other and one is left with a profound and vivid insight into...into...
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fiogf49gjkf0d Meanwhile, Arthur Dent has escaped from the Earth in the company of a friend of his, who has unexpectedly turned out to be from a small planet somewhere in the vicinity of Betelgeuse, and not from Guildford after all. His name is Ford Prefect, for reasons which are unlikely to become clear again at the moment, and they are currently hiding in the storeroom of a Vogon spaceship.
[Arthur Dent] What the hell is that?
[Ford Prefect] If we're lucky, it's a Vogon guard come to throw us out into space.
[Arthur Dent] And if we're unlucky?
[Ford Prefect] The Vogon captain might want to read us some of his poetry first.
(ROARING)
[Vogon Captain] Oh, freddled gruntbuggly!
Thy micturitions are to me
As plurdled gabbleblotchits on a lurgid bee
That mordiously hath bitled out its earted jurtles
(MOANING AND SCREAMING)
Now the jurpling slayjid agrocrustles
Are slurping hagrilly up the axlegruts
[Narrator] Vogon poetry is, of course, the third worst in the Universe. The second worst is that of the Azgoths of Kria. During a recitation by their poetmaster Grunthos the Flatulent of his poem: Ode to a Small Lump of Green Putty I found in my Armpit One Midsummer Morning, four of his audience died of internal haemorrhaging, and the president of the Mid-Galactic Arts Nobbling Council only survived by gnawing one of his own legs off. Grunthos is reported to have been disappointed by the poem's reception, and was about to embark on a reading of his 12-book epic entitled Zen and the Art of Going to the Lavatory when his own major intestine, in a desperate attempt to save lifekind, leapt straight up through his neck and throttled his brain.
The very worst poetry of all, and its creator, Paula Nancy Millstone Jennings, of Greenbridge, Essex, England, perished in the destruction of the planet Earth. Vogon poetry is mild by comparison.
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fiogf49gjkf0d (ROARING)
[Arthur Dent] What the hell's that?
[Ford Prefect] If we're lucky, it's a Vogon guard come to throw us into space.
[Arthur Dent] And if we're unlucky?
[Ford Prefect] The Vogon captain might want to read us some of his poetry first.
EPISODE 2:
Far out in the uncharted backwaters at the unfashionable end of the Western Spiral arm of the Galaxy, lies a small unregarded yellow sun. Orbiting this at a distance of roughly 92 million miles is an utterly insignificant little blue-green planet whose ape-descended lifeforms are so amazingly primitive that they still think digital watches are a pretty neat idea. This planet has - or had - a problem, which was this- most of the people living on it were unhappy for pretty much of the time. Many solutions were suggested for this problem, but most of these were largely concerned with the movements of small green pieces of paper, which is odd, because, on the whole, it wasn't the small green pieces of paper that were unhappy. And so the problem remained and lots of the people were mean, and most of them were miserable, even the ones with digital watches. (HORNS BLARE)
Many were increasingly of the opinion that they'd all made a big mistake in coming down from the trees in the first place. And some said that even the trees had been a bad move and that no one should ever have left the oceans. And then, one day, nearly 2,000 years after one man had been nailed to a tree for saying how great it would be to be nice to people for a change, a girl sitting on her own in a small cafe in Rickmansworth suddenly realized what it was had been going wrong all this time, and she finally knew how the world could be made a good and happy place. This time it was right, it would work, and no one would have to get nailed to anything. Sadly, however, before she could get to a phone to tell anyone, the Earth was demolished to make way for a hyperspace bypass and so the idea was lost forever.
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fiogf49gjkf0d (WHIRRING)
[Arthur Dent] It doesn't seem to have an entry.
[Ford Prefect] Yes, it does -- at the bottom of the screen. Under Eccentrica Cullumbits, the triple-breasted whore of Eroticon 6.
[Arthur Dent] Oh, yes. What does it say? "Harmless." Just one word? Harmless?
[Ford Prefect] Well, it's the old edition. Listen, there are 100 billion stars in the Galaxy and not much space in the book. No one knew much about Earth then, of course!
[Arthur Dent] Well I hope you managed to rectify that a bit!
[Ford Prefect] Well, yes. I transmitted a new entry off to the editor. It's not much, but it's still an improvement.
[Arthur Dent] What does it say now?
[Ford Prefect] "Mostly harmless."
[Arthur Dent] Mostly harmless?
[Ford Prefect] Oh, come. I think that's pretty good coverage for a disintegrated pile of rubble!
[Arthur Dent] I see. And that's supposed to make me feel better, is it?
[Ford Prefect] Come on! Let's get down to the teleport.
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fiogf49gjkf0d [Arthur Dent] Hey Ford, this towel has moved.
[Ford Prefect] Yes. That's a six-light-year jump. Good. That means we're near Barnard's Star. We can jump a ship there.
[Arthur Dent] Can we? Look, I hate to ask this Ford, but what exactly am I doing here?
[Ford Prefect] Simple. I rescued you from the Earth.
[Arthur Dent] Well, what happened to the Earth?
[Ford Prefect] It's been disintegrated.
[Arthur Dent] Has it?
[Ford Prefect] Yes. It just boiled away into space.
[Arthur Dent] Listen, I'm a bit upset about that.
[Ford Prefect] Oh, well.
[Arthur Dent] All gone? Nothing left? What about the book? Maybe the book's got something!
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fiogf49gjkf0d [Arthur Dent] What?
[Ford Prefect] Just do it!
[Arthur Dent] Like this?
[Ford Prefect] Right. Now wait.
[Arthur Dent] Excuse me, Ford, but what exactly am I doing with this fish in my ear?
[Ford Prefect] It's translating for you. Look in the book under Babel Fish.
(WHOOSHING)
[Arthur Dent] What's happening?
[Ford Prefect] We're going into hyperspace.
[Arthur Dent] I'll never be cruel to a gin and tonic again!
[HG] The Babel Fish is small, yellow, leechlike, and probably the oddest thing in the universe. It feeds on brain wave energy, absorbing all unconscious frequencies and then excreting telepathically a matrix formed from the conscious frequencies and nerve signals picked up from the speech centers of the brain, the practical upshot of which is that if you stick one in your ear, you can instantly understand anything said to you in any form of language: The speech you hear decodes the brain wave matrix.
Now it is such a bizarrely improbably coincidence that anything so mind-bogglingly useful could evolve purely by chance, that many thinkers have chosen to see it as a final and clinching proof of the non existence of God. The argument runs something like this. "I refuse to prove that I exist," says God. "For proof denies faith, and without faith I am nothing." "But," says man, "the babel fish is a dead giveaway, isn't it? It proves you exist and so therefore you don't. QED." "Oh dear," says God, "I hadn't thought of that," and promptly vanishes in a puff of logic. "Oh, that was easy," says man, and for an encore he goes on to prove that black is white and gets killed on the next zebra crossing.
Most leading theologians claim that this argument is a load of dingo's kidneys. But this didn't stop Oolon Colluphid making a small fortune when he used it as the central theme for his best selling book, "Well That About Wraps It Up for God."
Meanwhile, the poor babel fish, by effectively removing all barriers to communications between different cultures and races, has caused more and bloodier wars than anything else in the history of creation.
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fiogf49gjkf0d [Vogon Captain] ... should have a good time. Message repeats. This is your captain speaking, so stop whatever you're doing and pay attention. First of all, I see from our instruments that we have a couple of hitchhikers on board our ship. Hello, wherever you are! I just want to make it totally clear that you are not at all welcome. I worked hard to get where I am today and I didn't become captain of a Vogon ship simply to turn it into a taxi service for a lot of degenerate freeloaders. I have sent out a search party and as soon as they find you, I shall turn you off the ship. If you're very lucky, I might read you some of my poetry first.
Now secondly, we are about to jump into hyperspace for the journey to Barnard's Star. On arrival, we will stay in dock for 72 hours and all planet leave is canceled. I've just had an unhappy love affair, so I don't see why anybody else should have a good time. Message ends.
[Arthur Dent] Poetry? What are you doing?
[Ford Prefect] Preparing for hyperspace. It's rather unpleasantly like being drunk.
[Arthur Dent] What's so wrong about being drunk?
[Ford Prefect] Ask a glass of water. Now lie down, on your back. Grip the towel between your ankles like this.
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fiogf49gjkf0d (BLEEPING)
[Arthur Dent] What do you expect me to do with that?
[Ford Prefect] Stick it in your ear.
[Arthur Dent] What?!
[Ford Prefect] It's only a little one!
(GURGLING)
Listen, it's important.
[Arthur Dent] What?
[Ford Prefect] The Vogon captain.
[Arthur Dent] But I can't speak Vogon.
[Ford Prefect] You don't have to. Just put this in your ear!
[Arthur Dent] Yecch!
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fiogf49gjkf0d [Arthur Dent] Huh?
[Ford Prefect] Listen, it's a tough universe. There's all sorts of people trying to do you, kill you, rip you off, everything. If you're going to survive out there...you've really got to know where your towel is.
Now, fish.
[Arthur Dent] Huh?
[Ford Prefect] Fish. Over here, I think.
[Arthur Dent] Fish?
(ELECTRONIC WHIRRING)
[Ford Prefect] Fish.
[Arthur Dent] Very nice.
[Ford Prefect] Very, very useful.
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fiogf49gjkf0d [Arthur Dent] But how did you get here in the first place?
[Ford Prefect] Easy. I got a lift with a teaser ... Hypno rays?
[Arthur Dent] Teasers?
[FP} Yeah, teasers are rich kids with nothing to do. They cruise around the Galaxy looking for planets that no one's made contact with yet and buzz them.
[Arthur Dent] Buzz them?
[FP} Yeah. They find some isolated spot, and land right by some unsuspecting soul that no one's ever going to believe, and strut up and down in front of them, making beep-beep noises. Rather childish, really. Ah! A towel! Keep this and guard it with your life.
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fiogf49gjkf0d [Arthur Dent] But we've only just arrived. Aren't we going to say hello and thank you and things?
[Ford Prefect] Listen, this is a Vogon spaceship. We just pick up what we need and get off it! Right?
[Arthur Dent] Right.
[Ford Prefect] Stun guns.
[Arthur Dent] Any good?
[Ford Prefect] ...No.
[Arthur Dent] Ford, who are you?
[Ford Prefect] I told you -- I'm a field researcher for the Guide. Telecom systems.
(WHOOP)
[Ford Prefect] I got stuck on the Earth longer than I meant. Went for a week, got stuck for 15 years. Telepsychic helmets. Huh-huh!
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fiogf49gjkf0d [Ford Prefect] No. Dentrassi are the in-flight caterers. Hey, Hagra biscuit! The greatest! You'll love these guys! They cook the hoopiest frood food in the whole of the West Galaxy! Go on. Have a bite. Go on, go on, go on, try it. Your mouth will love you for the rest of your life.
[Arthur Dent] Oh, it's revolting!
[Ford Prefect] Oh, come on! This stuff is the greatest. Mmm! I think those guys must really hate the Vogons. Now, remember this -- Dentrassi hate Vogons. That's why they let us on board. Let's go!
[Arthur Dent] But if the Dentrassi let us on board, why doesn't the Guide mention them?
[Ford Prefect] It's not very accurate.
[Arthur Dent] Oh?
[Ford Prefect] I'm researching the new edition. Ah, storeroom.
[Arthur Dent] Where are we going?
[Ford Prefect] Who knows? Off this ship, that's for sure!
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fiogf49gjkf0d (BEEPING)
[HG] Vogon Constructor Fleets: Here is what to do if you want to get a lift from a Vogon ...Forget it. They are one of the most unpleasant races in the galaxy - not actually evil, but bad tempered, bureaucratic, officious and callous. They wouldn't even lift a finger to save their own grandmothers from the Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal without orders signed in triplicate, sent in, sent back, queried, lost, found, subjected to public enquiry and finally buried in soft peat for three months and recycled as fire lighters.
The best way to get a drink out of a Vogon is to stick your finger down his throat ..and the best way to annoy him is to feed his grandmother to the Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal.
[Arthur Dent] What an extraordinary book! How did we get on board, then?
[Ford Prefect] The Dentrassi let us on board.
[Arthur Dent] I thought you said they were called Bogons.
[Ford Prefect] Vogons.
[Arthur Dent] Not Dentrassi?
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fiogf49gjkf0d [Arthur Dent] But, Ford. What's going on?
[Ford Prefect] Here, have a look at this.
[Arthur Dent] What is it?
[Ford Prefect] The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, a sort of electronic book. It'll tell you everything you've got to know.
[Arthur Dent] I like the cover. "Don't panic"! That's the first helpful or intelligent thing anyone's said to me all day!
[Ford Prefect] Yes, that's why it sells so well. Shh!
[Arthur Dent] What?
[Ford Prefect] "Don't panic"! Look. Fast wind index ... V. Vogon Constructor Fleets. Enter that code and see what it says. I'll keep watch.
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fiogf49gjkf0d (GROANING)
[Arthur Dent] What's that, Ford? What the hell is it?
[Ford Prefect] Oh, come on. Let's get out of here.
[Arthur Dent] But Ford, it's going to attack us!
[Ford Prefect] No, no, no, it just wants us to turn the lights out. Come on. Shh! Sleeping quarters. We woke them up.
(CLANG!)
[Arthur Dent] Ford, they were ...
[Ford Prefect] What?
[Arthur Dent] Aliens?
[Ford Prefect] Dentrassi.
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fiogf49gjkf0d [Arthur Dent] Excuse me! Are you telling me we just stuck our thumbs out and some green bug-eyed monster popped his head out and said, "Hi fellows. Hop right in! I can take you as far as the Basingstoke roundabout"?
[Ford Prefect] Well, the thumb's an electronic sub-etha device, and the roundabout's at Barnard's Star, but otherwise that's more or less right.
[Arthur Dent] And the bug-eyed monster?
[Ford Prefect] Is green, yes!
[Arthur Dent] Fine. When can I go home?
[Ford Prefect] You can't. Ah!
[Arthur Dent] Good grief! Is this really the interior of a flying saucer?
[Ford Prefect] Yes. What do you think?
[Arthur Dent] Well, it's a big squalid, isn't it?
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fiogf49gjkf0d [Ford Prefect] I bought some peanuts.
[Arthur Dent] Uh?
[Ford Prefect] We've just been through a matter-transference beam. You've probably lost some salt and protein. The beer should have cushioned your system a bit. How are you feeling?
[Arthur Dent] Like a military academy. Bits of me keep passing out! Ford, if I asked you where the hell we were, would I regret it?
[Ford Prefect] We're safe.
[Arthur Dent] Ah, good.
[Ford Prefect] We're in a cabin of one of the ships of the Vogon constructor fleet.
[Arthur Dent] Ah, this is obviously some strange usage of the word "safe" that I hadn't previously been aware of. What are you doing?
[Ford Prefect] Looking for the light.
[Arthur Dent] How did we get here?
[Ford Prefect] We hitched a lift.
more...
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fiogf49gjkf0d Quite right. It could be worse...
"People of Earth, your attention please.
'This is Prostetnic Vogon Jeltz of the Galactic Hyperspace Planning Council. As you will no doubt be aware, the plans for development of the outlying regions of the Galaxy require the building of a hyperspatial express route through your star system and regrettably your planet is one of those scheduled for demolition. The process will take slightly less than two of your Earth minutes. Thank you.'
'...There's no point acting all surprised about it. All the planning charts and demolition orders have been on display in your local planning department in Alpha Centauri for fifty of your Earth years, so you've had plenty of time to lodge any formal complaint and it's far too late to start making a fuss about it now.'
'...What do you mean you've never been to Alpha Centauri? For heaven's sake, mankind, it's only four light years away, you know. I'm sorry, but if you can't be bothered to take an interest in local affairs, that's your own lookout.'
'Energize the demolition beams!'
'I don't know...apathetic bloody planet, I've no sympathy at all."
[Oh, yess! Any excuse to make a HHGttG reference...]
Tim P. Ryan:
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Galactacus goes: CHOMP
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fiogf49gjkf0d Galactacus goes: CHOMP
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fiogf49gjkf0d No doubt! I don't think that one can be topped.
Stavro Arrgolus:
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You forgot the best part. After that, a billion Indians riding concrete elephants invade China, bean them all with wooden wombats and then eat all the Chinese. It's our only hope, I'm thinking. Of course, an hour later....
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fiogf49gjkf0d You forgot the best part. After that, a billion Indians riding concrete elephants invade China, bean them all with wooden wombats and then eat all the Chinese. It's our only hope, I'm thinking. Of course, an hour later....
fm123:
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... and the asphalt aardvarks eat the rubber hamsters,
the rubber hamsters eat the dead baboons and
the Chinese make dinner from all of the above to feed their kids!
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fiogf49gjkf0d ... and the asphalt aardvarks eat the rubber hamsters,
the rubber hamsters eat the dead baboons and
the Chinese make dinner from all of the above to feed their kids!
Stavro Arrgolus:
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The raccoons eat the mouse corpses, the coyotes eat the raccoons and the bears eat the coyotes.
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fiogf49gjkf0d Amazing what crap a studio will release just to get a big tax write-off. It's the sort of thing that plays well during 'the Halloween season'.
The bucket trap is in the cellar where they get in. Lots of room there and gets to the root of the problem, which is in the compromised foundation. Not just mice but snakes get in somehow. All my annoyance at this years' non-stop rain is about the 'house maintenance' thing. Every cellar flood damages the foundation more. All that peanut butter on the can in the trap draws the mice from every part of the house and they eventually all get caught, get thrown outside and become raccoon chow. The raccoons eat the mouse corpses, the coyotes eat the raccoons and the bears eat the coyotes. It's the circle of life...or something.
...And Garrett Morris was in that movie. That alone should scream 'craptacular'.
Bob Guest:
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If there's Fluff in Canada, there could be Fluff anywhere..... Sort of reminds me of that cheap horror movie from years ago, "The Stuff".
Doesn't that "bucket contraption" get in the way? It seems a little big to me.
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fiogf49gjkf0d If there's Fluff in Canada, there could be Fluff anywhere..... Sort of reminds me of that cheap horror movie from years ago, "The Stuff".
Doesn't that "bucket contraption" get in the way? It seems a little big to me.
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fiogf49gjkf0d My little problem goes beyond single snap traps, so I use the bucket contraption to get them all. After awhile, they all turn up in rodent heaven no matter what part of the house they were found in to begin with. Because the can revolves in the center above the bucket, field mice can't reach the peanut butter without falling in, so there's no chance of having the bait scraped off. It need only be sticky. Maybe I'll try to put Fluff on one end and leave the peanut butter on the other.
Always thought Marshmallow Fluff was a 'Northeast thing'. I was waiting for someone to go "Fluff? What the hell's that?" Who knew?
Bob Guest:
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Fluff is not just a regional thing. It was very widespread through the 60s but disappeared for a while. But now it can be found just about anywhere.
The problem with peanut butter is that mice can scrape it off the trap without springing the trap. I suspect they'd be able to do the very same thing with Fluff. Marshmallows, on the other hand, are impaled right on the trigger mechanism. It's too thick and gooey for the mice to scrape off easily. They're more likely to spring the trap while trying.
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fiogf49gjkf0d Fluff is not just a regional thing. It was very widespread through the 60s but disappeared for a while. But now it can be found just about anywhere.
The problem with peanut butter is that mice can scrape it off the trap without springing the trap. I suspect they'd be able to do the very same thing with Fluff. Marshmallows, on the other hand, are impaled right on the trigger mechanism. It's too thick and gooey for the mice to scrape off easily. They're more likely to spring the trap while trying.
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fiogf49gjkf0d Best mouse bait on earth: tie a small piece of yarn on the trigger and douse it with bacon grease. Good for weeks and they can't steal the bait. Best of all, it draws mice like crazy!
Bob Guest:
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There's still a lot to be said for the traditional mouse trap. Of course, the bait is the real secret. Mice just laugh if you bait it with cheese, cause, contrary to popular belief, they really don't like it much. Peanut butter is a popular alternative, but it does have its drawbacks. The mice in my former place were too smart. They managed to scrape the peanut butter off the trap without springing it. Then I tried miniature marshmallows. Just poke them onto the trap and the mice will have a hard time trying to scrape it off. And marshmallows seems to draw them out. I've never had a marshmallow baited trap sit for more than an hour before catching a mouse. The record was about 10 seconds.
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fiogf49gjkf0d Ach und himmel! I'm having D&D flashbacks! I ran into a trap almost exactly like that in one dungeon. A bejeweled scepter in a shaft of light draws the adventurers into a slide trap. If you did not know where the protected walkway was, you fell into a pit of poisoned spikes. Tons of fun!
Reminds me of a redneck mosquito trap. Hang a light bulb over a bucket with kerosene in the bottom of it. Gets a lot of moths, too. And sometimes cousin Vern as well...
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fiogf49gjkf0d I still love those things. Always a good alternative to jelly. Especially for those of us who see no point (or are too damn lazy) in actually cooking a whole meal and washing a pile of dishes for just one person.
peterpuck9:
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Or you could make them a "Fluffernutter".....That's Marshmallow Fluff and Peanut Butter for those outside the region........
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fiogf49gjkf0d Or you could make them a "Fluffernutter".....That's Marshmallow Fluff and Peanut Butter for those outside the region........
Stavro Arrgolus:
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I used to like its commercial in the '70s or whenever- "Roll the dice...Build the trap...but could this thing really catch a mouse?" Couldn't find the original on YouTube. Of course, my mousetrap catches them in groups and there's no 'misses' and no escapes. Just lots of floating mouse corpses. Just grab them by the tails with needle nose pliers and throw them over the rapidly eroding embankment and into the 'black hole' of trees and 'shrubberies' in the backyard. The raccoons and coyotes do the rest.
I didn't know about the marshmallow thing. I have marshmallow Fluff (regional item). Wonder if that would work better than the peanut butter if spread on the end of the beer can?
peterpuck9:
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Did anyone ever have the game "Mouse Trap"?
Mouse Trap
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fiogf49gjkf0d I used to like its commercial in the '70s or whenever- "Roll the dice...Build the trap...but could this thing really catch a mouse?" Couldn't find the original on YouTube. Of course, my mousetrap catches them in groups and there's no 'misses' and no escapes. Just lots of floating mouse corpses. Just grab them by the tails with needle nose pliers and throw them over the rapidly eroding embankment and into the 'black hole' of trees and 'shrubberies' in the backyard. The raccoons and coyotes do the rest.
I didn't know about the marshmallow thing. I have marshmallow Fluff (regional item). Wonder if that would work better than the peanut butter if spread on the end of the beer can?
peterpuck9:
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Did anyone ever have the game "Mouse Trap"?
Mouse Trap
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fiogf49gjkf0d Did anyone ever have the game "Mouse Trap"?
Mouse Trap
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fiogf49gjkf0d There's still a lot to be said for the traditional mouse trap. Of course, the bait is the real secret. Mice just laugh if you bait it with cheese, cause, contrary to popular belief, they really don't like it much. Peanut butter is a popular alternative, but it does have its drawbacks. The mice in my former place were too smart. They managed to scrape the peanut butter off the trap without springing it. Then I tried miniature marshmallows. Just poke them onto the trap and the mice will have a hard time trying to scrape it off. And marshmallows seems to draw them out. I've never had a marshmallow baited trap sit for more than an hour before catching a mouse. The record was about 10 seconds.
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fiogf49gjkf0d Gotta be a better way to put these damn posts on top of the list without having to make a new one all the time. I once caught 9 mice in one night in the trap I described above. So many mice this year, I'll be hauling dead rodents out of here wholesale soon.
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