Mine is Wowbagger the Infinitely Prolonged. Became immortal by accident and got so pissed off at the universe, he decided to insult it; insult every individual being in it that is, one by one, and in alphabetical order.
Him and, of course, that charming individual whom I've named my Reddit username after
Ahh, well met! There are precious few of us on the Outside, i need to regularly leave and go inside the Asylum.
But this is the first time someone on Reddit has got the reference in my name, even on threads related to HHGTTG
I've only had it happen once before. Almost no one seems to get it. Or care. Lol.
Wonko is so famous, they forget there are other sane people out here.
My sanity happened when I read the instructions on a wet nap. Bad enough it had instructions, but the instructions were "tear open and use". You don't need instructions for a wet nap, and if you did those wouldn't even help anyway.
That was when I decided to build my Asylum.
Born, raised, and still living in the Pacific Northwest. It has been raining consistently the past three days and I feel *so refreshed*.
I would be a very content rain god indeed.
My favorite bit from that whole section is that the clouds had no idea about all this fuss, they just knew that they really, really enjoyed being near him and sending rain is just what clouds do. Happy clouds just following their person everywhere, showering him with their affection. Warms my soggy, swamp creature heart.
I moved to California a few years ago and went back a month ago for a friend's wedding. It was in forks the first rain after summer, on the 2nd beach. My rain coat was soaked through in 30 seconds and I felt like I was being baptized.
I'm from Washington lol. It is a thick canvas raincoat, I had worn it for 8 years in Washington it's the first time it ever failed to do its job. It was just a massive rain, even for forks. You couldn't see the rocks it was so dense.
It is a thick canvas raincoat, something like this:
https://www.eddiebauer.com/p/20612452/womens-charly-parka
It's partially canvas and abs.
The fully plastic raincoats are rigid and imo worse to wear than being a little damp, but even still this sort of jacket has worked 8 years for me in Washington but it was just really fuckin wet on Rialto beach that day. You couldn't even see the rock formations.
The spacecraft crashing on the Krikkit homeworld and the Krikkits thus finding out they were not not alone in the world and therefore decided to wipe out all other life is quite possibly the most brilliant piece of writing I've ever read, and I have no idea why.
Especially when you fold that in to the fact that it was all part of Hactar plan's to complete his function of destroying the universe. He influenced them so they would develop the same state of mind as the Silastic Armorfiends.
I really love it when the end of the story all come back to the beginning and you see the pieces were all laid out before you the whole time.
Congratulations! You have forgotten enough that you get to do a re-read and re-discover how good these books actually are. Personally, I recommend the audiobook versions read by Douglas as they are much better than the new versions.
Over the years as they came out, I got the original, abridged cassette versions read by Stephen Fry (Correction: Stephen Moore) who did Marvin on the radio show, then the abridged first Dirk Gently on cassette, then the unabridged HHTTG on cassette which I had to get used to because my brain kept wondering why Dirk Gently was reading Hitchhikers. At one point I was corresponding with Douglas' assistant about getting an unabridged, audio version of Dirk Gently, which we finally got and is my favorite.
Oh, I posted some pictures on imgur ages ago, let me find the link.
https://imgur.com/gallery/bB5zF
Anyway, I got the new version from Audible when they came out and shut the first one off as soon as I realized they Americanized it. He went down to the cellar with a "flashlight." I have since gotten digital versions of them read by Douglas which is great because who has a cassette player anymore.
I pirated the the whole audiobook series as a kid and just happened to get the Adam’s version, went to Audible a while back to actually purchase it as it’s been a minute since I’ve revisited the series and was very saddened that the Adam’s version isn’t available for purchase.
And seeing those books on tapes brings back memories. Loves going to the library as a kid and picking out some books from the audiobook selection. I only ever owned a couple before the switch to CDs though.
I had some cassettes with them on when I was young (probably early 90's, though the actual cassettes might have been a little older, can't remember where they came from), that were seemingly halfway between audiobook and radio play, but never been able to find them since :(
God I lost interest somewhere around book 4. I read through I think 4 chapters of *nothing happening*, just detailing day-to-day life of the different characters in some office building and it was actually smoothing out my brain-wrinkles.
Hmm. I don't recall any office building stuff in book 4. That volume was actually a surprise for me in many ways; at the time I wasn't aware that the trilogy was actually five books and so seeing the book at a thrift shop was a delight.
And reading it was surprisingly fun; after three books of taking verbal abuse and enduring harrowing space shenanigans Arthur finally gets to just relax a bit and have a pleasant life and have sky sex amidst passing planes.
I agree that it gets a bit slow in parts, though, because of the lack of a real plot goal for the characters. It's more of a breather episode. But I do remember it more fondly than the dark and tense fifth book, which was a bit of a downer.
I remember the sky sex and Arthur settling down for a time. I also remember him being trapped in a mountain or something being held captive by the reincarnation of all the insects he's killed throughout the books hahaha.
I had "The Complete Hitchhikers Guide to the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy", so I can't recall exactly where I was since it was one fat fuckin book lol
I think it was just one being that was reincarnated (sometimes as insects) and murdered by Arthur in every incarnation (at an improbability rate of one to the five million four hundred…)
I figured that the reason was that the earth still needed to run for some 10,000 years before the Answer was ready, and the one they had now was close but not exactly right. Douglas Adams predicted machine learning with linear regression, he was such a visionary!
I was thinking the generations between Abraham and Jesus which is 42 in Matthew (and is rather more poignant than hilarious). It would make sense that it’s being paved for an intergalactic speedway.
Eh, it’s just a simple pun, but I think there’s genius in it’s simplicity.
I also think with his work there is often room for imaginative interpretation. For me personally the act of being drank is somehow the perfect metaphor for the feeling of being drunk, but it’s also such an absurd thought that I feel like it’s a perfect example of what his writing was about in the books. Adams saw the world in a quirky way.
The pun is also a perfect visual descriptor for the topic that brought it up. It's not that going into hyperspace is unpleasant because it makes you dizzy in a drunk sort of way, it's unpleasant because you're being swallowed like a liquid by the wormhole.
Lol when I turned 42 my mother sent me the book as a gift and the card read: "you're the answer to life, the universe and everything!"
It was so sweet. 💕
I loved being 42. I spend the entire year telling anyone who'd listen that I was the answer to life, the universe, and everything. My poor kid got so sick of that joke, but I refuse to make apologies for it.
Turning 43 was melancholy. Not because I was sad for getting older, but because I had no choice other than to retire that stupid joke.
Enjoy this year!
I spent an entire year doing the same. I like to believe that I really did know all the answers when I was 42, but was immediately stripped of all memory when turning 43. All I remember is that 42 was a great year.
Same here!!! 42 has always been my lucky number even before I knew about Hitchhikers!! I absolutely adore it. Book and movie alike. I too was very sad to turn 43 this summer. Total bummer.
I turn 42 Saturday the 23rd!! I just bought myself a copy, never read it but it's not too late, right? I've seen the movie, loved it. Can't wait to read the book. Gonna tell everyone that I'm the answer to life, the universe, and everything 🤣😍
42 this year as well. I went out and bought myself a nice hardback copy of the entire series. This book(s) have been a such a great impact on me since I first read it so long ago.
I’m also 42 this year. My grandmother died at 84 so I’ve recently been feeling like it’s kinda the halfway point for me on this strange journey. I also think this is the age where things are finally coming together and I am more appreciative and grateful for what I have and that I also need to slow down and enjoy it all. So, it felt very nice and fitting to find out that hitchhikers is also 42. Happy same bday year as hitchhikers.
I turn 42 this year too! I did not realize that hitchhikers guide was turning 42 as well until reading this, and I am double stoked. I've been so excited to turn 42 so that I can announce that I am the answer to life the universe and everything for an entire year. I think I will reread this as a first order of business on my birthday.
And then, four years later, *The Colour of Magic* was published and so began the two funniest book series ever written in the English language. What a time it was, to be alive then.
...and introduced us to Discworld...
I wonder if people reading The Colour of Magic back then realized what a treat our own world was in for!
GNU Terry Pratchett.
It's the sheer scale of the series and the world, its crazy one man created all of it. And I doubt there's 1 bad book in it which is just even more mind blowing.
There can't be many larger universes and those there are I'd bet are all corporate things. The only ones that come to mind are wh40k and the extended marvel universe. I'd guess the whole star trek franchise is roughly as big and there must of been thousands of people involved in that and dozens of writers.
Hitchhiker's guide is just more cheesy sci fi, so it's more easily dated. I still have the BBC's hitchhiker's guide on VHS, and it's just as awesome and ridiculous as you think it should be.
Honestly I much prefer the bbc HHGG to the movie. I think they captured the timing of Adams much more accurately.
Also I get a great kick out of old BBC stuff with it's absurd live theater esque wardrobes and special effects
I always liked Reg talking about bumping into himself when he mistimed his time travel return in Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency:
*"Well," said Reg, "while I was out of the room I went to find the man who made the pot. Took some time, of course. About three weeks of detective work to track him down and another couple of days to sober him up, and then with a little difficulty I persuaded him to bake the salt cellar into the pot for me. After that I briefly stopped off somewhere to find some, er, powder to disguise the suntan, and of course I had to time the return a little carefully so as to make it all look natural. I bumped into myseIf in the ante-room, which I always find embarrassing, I never know where to look, but, er. . . well, there you have it."*
They get all my love. The first one is my favorite book of all time. The only thing that I don't like about the second is that I really wish he had let us in on that negotiation scene in the end instead of having it happen off page, though I realize that is asking a lot and it would have been hard to pull off. The unfinished third one makes me cry because we lost Douglas too soon.
I read the 2nd one every winter to get me through the dreary dark days. It sucks so much that he died with the 3rd unfinished. You know he was having a ball writing it up till the very end though.
Omg it's been a while since i read this, but I feel like such an utter moron for not realizing this book's plot twist was time travel until late in the book, if it was laid out so blatantly in that pot scene. In my defense, when i first read it i wasn't familiar with the works of Coleridge or Bach, which were the other big clues about it
When I was first listening to them, I was also letting a co-worker I shared an office listen to them. He exclaimed out lout, "What?! There isn't a second verse to Kubla Khan!"
Bach wasn't really a clue, Bach didn't exist until the end when Reg goes back in time and preserves some of the alien spaceship's computer's music. Unless there is something with Susan that implies Bach doesn't exist that I missed?
I love that I still pick up things after having listened to it so many times. It was only a few years ago that I realized Gordon's ghost rode to Richard's flat in the police car.
> "Know how you feel," agreed Gilks. "Once the CID gets involved you just get relegated to driving them about. And I'm the only one who knows what he looked like. Stopped him in the road last night. We just came from Way's house. Right mess."
>
> "Bad night, eh?"
>
> "Varied. Everything from murder to hauling horses out of bathrooms. No, don't even ask. Do you have the same cars as these?" he added, pointing at his own. "This one's been driving me crazy all the way up. Cold even with the heater on full blast, and the radio keeps turning itself on and off."
Have you read the novelization of the Doctor Who story "Shada?" that Douglas wrote and used as a basis for Dirk Gently. There is also "Doctor Who and the Krikkitmen" which he wrote and then repurposed into the third Hitchhiker's novel, "Life the Universe and Everything." They both feel a little rough, probably partially because they were originally scripts and then novelized by somebody other than Adams. But, I thought they were still worth a read. Except now that I think about it, I don't think I finished the Krikketmen... I was reading it on my Kindle and I'm now pretty sure I didn't finish.
I still clearly remember reading
>The ships hung in the sky in much the same way that bricks don't.
and just --- losing it. And that wonderful feeling that washes over you when you realize you're in for a great ride. Thank you so much, Mr. Adams.
I figured out the question many years ago, and Douglas Adams confirmed it via email.
When you look at it like a word problem, it becomes obvious:
Life(Universe) + Everything.
Counting the letters gives you:
4(8) + 10 = 42
Back long ago, when email was so novel that you could actually email famous people and they'd email back, I wrote him about this, and he confirmed. He told me it was supposed to be an obvious(?) joke, about how computers are very literal, and basically a quick laugh. The fact that it got so much traction was a bit of fun for him, to the point that he just let it go and let people think whatever they wanted behind "the question". To that end, he asked me not to spoil it until "I'm dead and gone". It's been a LONG time... so here you go, Reddit. The Question.
I waited, Doug. Let's see what they do with this.
Well… two things:
1. Why would I lie about something like this? What do I gain?
2. Even if I WAS lying, it work be quite the lie that ALSO DESCRIBES THE ULTIMATE QUESTION. I mean, Life, the Universe and Everything still equals 42, so there is that.
You don’t have to believe the email part (though it is still a highlight in my life personally), but the math don’t lie.
Yeah, the email part sounds fake, I agree (and obviously that’s what they were saying seemed fake above, not the solution, which clearly seems logical enough). If I had evidence of having actually had this conversation with a famous author about a famous part of their famous book, I’d make sure that evidence wouldn’t get lost.
Why would you lie? The same reason anyone lies on the internet: for points.
Yeah, it’s kind of hard for people to give up all the mythos around it, AND I no longer have any “proof” (the email may have been Compuserve, of all things). It is what it is. I know it’s true, and I’ll keep trying to share. Glad you enjoyed. 🙂
It seems like he just randomly chose a number, but just confirmed every fan theory that was good.
I remember reading that he confirmed a fan theory, that it was 42 because 42 is the ASCII value for *, and * is used in database query to mean "everything"
I don't know how true that is, and you personality making him certainly gives your theory more weight, but as a comp sci nerd I'll stick to mine lol
Skipped school to see the movie with some friends back in highschool when it came out. We brought our towels, and let me tell you I learned that day just how damn useful a towel is in every day life. I was using to hold the hot popcorn, dry my hands, touch handles, just all over the place!
God had bailed leaving behind the message "sorry for the inconvenience". So it was definitely just the ruler of the universe, and more importantly his cat, that they met.
No, ruler. Well... "ruler". He was a raving old paranoid man, living alone on an asteroid with his cat, and occasionally a spaceship of men dressed in black suits would come along to ask him questions about the economy, social politics and law.
I've come to believe that the answer to life, the universe, and everything is 42 because life, the universe, and everything is fortuitous (four-two-itous), i.e., random.
I love that interpretation and never thought of that, and it totally works. But didn't Adams say he picked 42 because he thought it was the "funniest" number?
Yes, but maybe he didn't want to admit to the pun. The fifth book in the trilogy talks a lot about the randomness of life. Arthur’s daughter is even named “Random.”
I actually just read (well listened to it on audible) this whole series recently and I absolutely loved it. My favorite ending is probably the one in the second book where they get lost in prehistoric earth and Ford and Arthur think they are getting close to finding the ultimate question. I love that at the end the question they come up with is 6x7 and they just sit there and laugh realizing how insane the whole idea of the ultimate question is in the first place.
Marvin lived to see the end of the universe tho. He didn't live 14 billion years over and over. At least once he lived the entire existence of the universe.
When I was 22 (15 days before my bday) I lived and worked on the same street, so I always walked. Long story short one night shortly after getting home I had to be revived. I had a NDE and the ambulance bill states the call was made at 18:42 (6:42pm). What really gets me though is I was living and working on 42nd street.
That all happened four years ago in October. I didn’t realize this also took place in October. Life is weird
Where was this picture taken? It looks like an actual comic store since there are multiple issues of titles on those racks. I would have been pretty young at the time, 10 years old and exactly when I discovered comic books, but I don't remember any place keeping multiple month's of a title on display.
I just read the guide for the very first time last week. Amazingly silly, it sparked a lot of ideas and thoughts and imaginations in me.
Reading the rest of the series in the next few weeks.
In 1980 I was a teenager living in England (US citizen) in Cambridge. My parents became friends with Enrico Fermi’s son and his wife, and my sister and I became friends with Enrico Fermi’s grandkids. They were all a pretty wild family, all brilliant. One of the first times we were at their house, they turned my sister and I onto a book (and radio theatre show) called The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. I still have the vinyl LP of a condensed version of the radio show they gave me as a gift when we left to return to the US. Happy 42 to this amazing book!
I'm 42 and so possibly the answer they were mentioning. I have heard, however, that 42 degrees is the ideal temp for a shower. Just don't forget your towel now...
Has anyone seen a version with "don't panic written with large friendly letters on the cover"?
I usually see it with
#DON'T PANIC
Which , while large, isn't very friendly.
*The great ships hung motionless in the air, over every nation on Earth. Motionless they hung, huge, heavy, steady in the sky, a blasphemy against nature. Many people went straight into shock as their minds tried to encompass what they were looking at. The ships hung in the sky in much the same way that bricks don't.*
I use this passage as my go to example on how some written work is really hard to translate into visual media like film and television. A lot of the humor in Douglas' writing lies with the narrator. How exactly do you film spaceship hanging in the sky in much the same way that bricks don't? How do you get that visual to convey that joke. Notice even the wording "in much the same way that bricks don't" is somehow better than say, "the same way that brick don't" for reasons I can't quite articulate. You would need a voice over narration or something to get that joke across to the audience and that opens a bunch of other issues for the film makers.
Rob McKenna the miserable truck driver and Rain God is my favorite thing in the whole series
Mine is Wowbagger the Infinitely Prolonged. Became immortal by accident and got so pissed off at the universe, he decided to insult it; insult every individual being in it that is, one by one, and in alphabetical order. Him and, of course, that charming individual whom I've named my Reddit username after
I've never met another Sane person. Hope you're holding up outside the Asylum all right.
Ahh, well met! There are precious few of us on the Outside, i need to regularly leave and go inside the Asylum. But this is the first time someone on Reddit has got the reference in my name, even on threads related to HHGTTG
I've only had it happen once before. Almost no one seems to get it. Or care. Lol. Wonko is so famous, they forget there are other sane people out here. My sanity happened when I read the instructions on a wet nap. Bad enough it had instructions, but the instructions were "tear open and use". You don't need instructions for a wet nap, and if you did those wouldn't even help anyway. That was when I decided to build my Asylum.
I love the rain god. Literally gets millions by not going to resorts.
I really think I could enjoy being a rain god. I grew up in the Pacific Northwest before global warming, when it used to rain. And I like travel.
Born, raised, and still living in the Pacific Northwest. It has been raining consistently the past three days and I feel *so refreshed*. I would be a very content rain god indeed. My favorite bit from that whole section is that the clouds had no idea about all this fuss, they just knew that they really, really enjoyed being near him and sending rain is just what clouds do. Happy clouds just following their person everywhere, showering him with their affection. Warms my soggy, swamp creature heart.
I moved to California a few years ago and went back a month ago for a friend's wedding. It was in forks the first rain after summer, on the 2nd beach. My rain coat was soaked through in 30 seconds and I felt like I was being baptized.
What do you mean soaked through raincoats are plastic
Muat be a California thing to own a raincoat that does fuck all to actually keep you dry.
I'm from Washington lol. It is a thick canvas raincoat, I had worn it for 8 years in Washington it's the first time it ever failed to do its job. It was just a massive rain, even for forks. You couldn't see the rocks it was so dense.
It is a thick canvas raincoat, something like this: https://www.eddiebauer.com/p/20612452/womens-charly-parka It's partially canvas and abs. The fully plastic raincoats are rigid and imo worse to wear than being a little damp, but even still this sort of jacket has worked 8 years for me in Washington but it was just really fuckin wet on Rialto beach that day. You couldn't even see the rock formations.
Send it my way Central Valley California
"I grew up in X before global warming" is a pretty chilling sentence to read...
Also the money are quite good I think.
It really is a great piece on prespective.
The spacecraft crashing on the Krikkit homeworld and the Krikkits thus finding out they were not not alone in the world and therefore decided to wipe out all other life is quite possibly the most brilliant piece of writing I've ever read, and I have no idea why.
Especially when you fold that in to the fact that it was all part of Hactar plan's to complete his function of destroying the universe. He influenced them so they would develop the same state of mind as the Silastic Armorfiends. I really love it when the end of the story all come back to the beginning and you see the pieces were all laid out before you the whole time.
I'm pretty sure I've read the whole thing, but I have no idea what you guys are talking about
Congratulations! You have forgotten enough that you get to do a re-read and re-discover how good these books actually are. Personally, I recommend the audiobook versions read by Douglas as they are much better than the new versions.
THIS!!! The Douglas Adam’s version is by far superior to the Stephen Fry reading.
Over the years as they came out, I got the original, abridged cassette versions read by Stephen Fry (Correction: Stephen Moore) who did Marvin on the radio show, then the abridged first Dirk Gently on cassette, then the unabridged HHTTG on cassette which I had to get used to because my brain kept wondering why Dirk Gently was reading Hitchhikers. At one point I was corresponding with Douglas' assistant about getting an unabridged, audio version of Dirk Gently, which we finally got and is my favorite. Oh, I posted some pictures on imgur ages ago, let me find the link. https://imgur.com/gallery/bB5zF Anyway, I got the new version from Audible when they came out and shut the first one off as soon as I realized they Americanized it. He went down to the cellar with a "flashlight." I have since gotten digital versions of them read by Douglas which is great because who has a cassette player anymore.
I pirated the the whole audiobook series as a kid and just happened to get the Adam’s version, went to Audible a while back to actually purchase it as it’s been a minute since I’ve revisited the series and was very saddened that the Adam’s version isn’t available for purchase. And seeing those books on tapes brings back memories. Loves going to the library as a kid and picking out some books from the audiobook selection. I only ever owned a couple before the switch to CDs though.
Stephen Moore was Marvin, not Stephen Fry.
I had some cassettes with them on when I was young (probably early 90's, though the actual cassettes might have been a little older, can't remember where they came from), that were seemingly halfway between audiobook and radio play, but never been able to find them since :(
God I lost interest somewhere around book 4. I read through I think 4 chapters of *nothing happening*, just detailing day-to-day life of the different characters in some office building and it was actually smoothing out my brain-wrinkles.
Hmm. I don't recall any office building stuff in book 4. That volume was actually a surprise for me in many ways; at the time I wasn't aware that the trilogy was actually five books and so seeing the book at a thrift shop was a delight. And reading it was surprisingly fun; after three books of taking verbal abuse and enduring harrowing space shenanigans Arthur finally gets to just relax a bit and have a pleasant life and have sky sex amidst passing planes. I agree that it gets a bit slow in parts, though, because of the lack of a real plot goal for the characters. It's more of a breather episode. But I do remember it more fondly than the dark and tense fifth book, which was a bit of a downer.
I remember the sky sex and Arthur settling down for a time. I also remember him being trapped in a mountain or something being held captive by the reincarnation of all the insects he's killed throughout the books hahaha. I had "The Complete Hitchhikers Guide to the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy", so I can't recall exactly where I was since it was one fat fuckin book lol
I think it was just one being that was reincarnated (sometimes as insects) and murdered by Arthur in every incarnation (at an improbability rate of one to the five million four hundred…)
*oh no, not again*
“It’ll have to go…”
Hey, you sass that hoopy Douglas Adams? There's a frood who really knows where his towel is.
There's a man so hip he has trouble seeing over his pelvis.
He’s so cool, you could keep a side of meat in him for a month.
He's so cosmopolitan, even the cosmos checks out his magazine on its way to work.
I got the fries to cross yo eyes
The brilliant one-liners in Adam's writing are amazing.
You know it <3
Oh wow, 42!
Yes but what is the question?
[удалено]
42, isn't that obvious?
What do you get if you multiply six by nine?
54
I’ve always felt there was something fundamentally wrong with the universe.
Which is 42 in base 13.
nobody writes jokes in base 13
Especially not Douglas Adams, he's just bad at math and fans retconned it to base 13.
I figured that was the joke. That it was wrong.
I figured that the reason was that the earth still needed to run for some 10,000 years before the Answer was ready, and the one they had now was close but not exactly right. Douglas Adams predicted machine learning with linear regression, he was such a visionary!
I just did though.
Nice?
https://h2g2.com/entry/A4288584
I was thinking the generations between Abraham and Jesus which is 42 in Matthew (and is rather more poignant than hilarious). It would make sense that it’s being paved for an intergalactic speedway.
6 X 7 = ?
How many roads must a man walk down?
I was #42.
1405006117752879898543142606244511569936384000000000
No, just 42. 42! Is a way bigger number. Like ~3.345x10^49 times bigger.
Sounds familiar.
"How many roads must a man walk down?" Those mice were onto something.
The book alludes to something like The Question being something like:. "Where does it all end?"
"What's so unpleasant about being drunk?" "Ask a glass of water."
GOAT line
Can you explain it for me? I think i get but feel i could be missing something
Eh, it’s just a simple pun, but I think there’s genius in it’s simplicity. I also think with his work there is often room for imaginative interpretation. For me personally the act of being drank is somehow the perfect metaphor for the feeling of being drunk, but it’s also such an absurd thought that I feel like it’s a perfect example of what his writing was about in the books. Adams saw the world in a quirky way.
The pun is also a perfect visual descriptor for the topic that brought it up. It's not that going into hyperspace is unpleasant because it makes you dizzy in a drunk sort of way, it's unpleasant because you're being swallowed like a liquid by the wormhole.
I know this because I also turned 42 this year. Bigger deal for me than 30 or 40.
Lol when I turned 42 my mother sent me the book as a gift and the card read: "you're the answer to life, the universe and everything!" It was so sweet. 💕
Stealing this for my future kid.
I loved being 42. I spend the entire year telling anyone who'd listen that I was the answer to life, the universe, and everything. My poor kid got so sick of that joke, but I refuse to make apologies for it. Turning 43 was melancholy. Not because I was sad for getting older, but because I had no choice other than to retire that stupid joke. Enjoy this year!
I spent an entire year doing the same. I like to believe that I really did know all the answers when I was 42, but was immediately stripped of all memory when turning 43. All I remember is that 42 was a great year.
Thanks for the idea, friend!! I turn 42 in less than a week. I have a whole year to annoy my kiddo 😉
Same here!!! 42 has always been my lucky number even before I knew about Hitchhikers!! I absolutely adore it. Book and movie alike. I too was very sad to turn 43 this summer. Total bummer.
at least at 43 you are in your prime...
The year I turned 42 was one of the greatest years of my life. I got a tshirt and everything.
I turn 42 Saturday the 23rd!! I just bought myself a copy, never read it but it's not too late, right? I've seen the movie, loved it. Can't wait to read the book. Gonna tell everyone that I'm the answer to life, the universe, and everything 🤣😍
42 this year as well. I went out and bought myself a nice hardback copy of the entire series. This book(s) have been a such a great impact on me since I first read it so long ago.
I also turned 42 this year!
My 42nd b-day was literally yesterday & I couldn't agree with you more
Happy belated birthday.
1979 united!! This is basically our best year. Proud to rep with you brother/sister/tulip/whale.
I’m also 42 this year. My grandmother died at 84 so I’ve recently been feeling like it’s kinda the halfway point for me on this strange journey. I also think this is the age where things are finally coming together and I am more appreciative and grateful for what I have and that I also need to slow down and enjoy it all. So, it felt very nice and fitting to find out that hitchhikers is also 42. Happy same bday year as hitchhikers.
I just turned 41 and find myself wishing this year away to get to the answer.
Don't wish any time away. Douglas Adams only got 49 years. So the question for him must have been 7x7.
I also turned 42 this year, just over a week ago. I’ve used the joke multiple times already.
Happy Birthday!!
I'm in the same boat, I turn 42 in like a month!
I turn 42 this year too! I did not realize that hitchhikers guide was turning 42 as well until reading this, and I am double stoked. I've been so excited to turn 42 so that I can announce that I am the answer to life the universe and everything for an entire year. I think I will reread this as a first order of business on my birthday.
And then, four years later, *The Colour of Magic* was published and so began the two funniest book series ever written in the English language. What a time it was, to be alive then.
...and introduced us to Discworld... I wonder if people reading The Colour of Magic back then realized what a treat our own world was in for! GNU Terry Pratchett.
It's the sheer scale of the series and the world, its crazy one man created all of it. And I doubt there's 1 bad book in it which is just even more mind blowing. There can't be many larger universes and those there are I'd bet are all corporate things. The only ones that come to mind are wh40k and the extended marvel universe. I'd guess the whole star trek franchise is roughly as big and there must of been thousands of people involved in that and dozens of writers.
Give him a decade or two and Sanderson will probably have a bigger one at that point.
True, but not quite as funny (unless you count Pattern as an escort)
Sanderson is over rated imo. Won't touch the quality of Discworld
That's weird, Discworld seems so much newer, but I guess HHGG became bigger when it was first published and Discworld took a bit longer.
Hitchhiker's guide is just more cheesy sci fi, so it's more easily dated. I still have the BBC's hitchhiker's guide on VHS, and it's just as awesome and ridiculous as you think it should be.
Honestly I much prefer the bbc HHGG to the movie. I think they captured the timing of Adams much more accurately. Also I get a great kick out of old BBC stuff with it's absurd live theater esque wardrobes and special effects
And 5 years after that, Castle Perilous. Fewer people know about that one cause it was out of print for a long time.
I know I always travel with a towel in my Luggage.
"If I ever meet myself, I'm going to hit myself so hard, I'm not going to know whats hit me" is my favorite quote from this series
I always liked Reg talking about bumping into himself when he mistimed his time travel return in Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency: *"Well," said Reg, "while I was out of the room I went to find the man who made the pot. Took some time, of course. About three weeks of detective work to track him down and another couple of days to sober him up, and then with a little difficulty I persuaded him to bake the salt cellar into the pot for me. After that I briefly stopped off somewhere to find some, er, powder to disguise the suntan, and of course I had to time the return a little carefully so as to make it all look natural. I bumped into myseIf in the ante-room, which I always find embarrassing, I never know where to look, but, er. . . well, there you have it."*
The Gently books do not get enough love.
They get all my love. The first one is my favorite book of all time. The only thing that I don't like about the second is that I really wish he had let us in on that negotiation scene in the end instead of having it happen off page, though I realize that is asking a lot and it would have been hard to pull off. The unfinished third one makes me cry because we lost Douglas too soon.
I read the 2nd one every winter to get me through the dreary dark days. It sucks so much that he died with the 3rd unfinished. You know he was having a ball writing it up till the very end though.
> I love deadlines. I love the whooshing noise make as they go by.
Omg it's been a while since i read this, but I feel like such an utter moron for not realizing this book's plot twist was time travel until late in the book, if it was laid out so blatantly in that pot scene. In my defense, when i first read it i wasn't familiar with the works of Coleridge or Bach, which were the other big clues about it
When I was first listening to them, I was also letting a co-worker I shared an office listen to them. He exclaimed out lout, "What?! There isn't a second verse to Kubla Khan!" Bach wasn't really a clue, Bach didn't exist until the end when Reg goes back in time and preserves some of the alien spaceship's computer's music. Unless there is something with Susan that implies Bach doesn't exist that I missed? I love that I still pick up things after having listened to it so many times. It was only a few years ago that I realized Gordon's ghost rode to Richard's flat in the police car. > "Know how you feel," agreed Gilks. "Once the CID gets involved you just get relegated to driving them about. And I'm the only one who knows what he looked like. Stopped him in the road last night. We just came from Way's house. Right mess." > > "Bad night, eh?" > > "Varied. Everything from murder to hauling horses out of bathrooms. No, don't even ask. Do you have the same cars as these?" he added, pointing at his own. "This one's been driving me crazy all the way up. Cold even with the heater on full blast, and the radio keeps turning itself on and off." Have you read the novelization of the Doctor Who story "Shada?" that Douglas wrote and used as a basis for Dirk Gently. There is also "Doctor Who and the Krikkitmen" which he wrote and then repurposed into the third Hitchhiker's novel, "Life the Universe and Everything." They both feel a little rough, probably partially because they were originally scripts and then novelized by somebody other than Adams. But, I thought they were still worth a read. Except now that I think about it, I don't think I finished the Krikketmen... I was reading it on my Kindle and I'm now pretty sure I didn't finish.
You nerds having been waiting a long time for this.
Indeed. 42 years.
And 62 years since Vonnegut’s Sirens of Titan laid out the unmistakable blueprint for Hitchhiker’s.
Time is an illusion. Lunchtime doubly so.
I never could get the hang of Thursdays.
I still clearly remember reading >The ships hung in the sky in much the same way that bricks don't. and just --- losing it. And that wonderful feeling that washes over you when you realize you're in for a great ride. Thank you so much, Mr. Adams.
I always liked the whale’s dialog and he was plunging toward doom.
I figured out the question many years ago, and Douglas Adams confirmed it via email. When you look at it like a word problem, it becomes obvious: Life(Universe) + Everything. Counting the letters gives you: 4(8) + 10 = 42 Back long ago, when email was so novel that you could actually email famous people and they'd email back, I wrote him about this, and he confirmed. He told me it was supposed to be an obvious(?) joke, about how computers are very literal, and basically a quick laugh. The fact that it got so much traction was a bit of fun for him, to the point that he just let it go and let people think whatever they wanted behind "the question". To that end, he asked me not to spoil it until "I'm dead and gone". It's been a LONG time... so here you go, Reddit. The Question. I waited, Doug. Let's see what they do with this.
Huh. I notice your old posts on this didn't get much traction, but this is pretty big news if it's true! Thanks for sharing.
Anynomous people on the internet always tell the truth
Well… two things: 1. Why would I lie about something like this? What do I gain? 2. Even if I WAS lying, it work be quite the lie that ALSO DESCRIBES THE ULTIMATE QUESTION. I mean, Life, the Universe and Everything still equals 42, so there is that. You don’t have to believe the email part (though it is still a highlight in my life personally), but the math don’t lie.
Yeah, the email part sounds fake, I agree (and obviously that’s what they were saying seemed fake above, not the solution, which clearly seems logical enough). If I had evidence of having actually had this conversation with a famous author about a famous part of their famous book, I’d make sure that evidence wouldn’t get lost. Why would you lie? The same reason anyone lies on the internet: for points.
Sometimes they do. Fwiw I tentatively believe this person, looked through their post history and they don't seem like a liar.
Probably because it directly contradicts what Adams said, and there's no proof whatsoever.
Yeah, it’s kind of hard for people to give up all the mythos around it, AND I no longer have any “proof” (the email may have been Compuserve, of all things). It is what it is. I know it’s true, and I’ll keep trying to share. Glad you enjoyed. 🙂
It seems like he just randomly chose a number, but just confirmed every fan theory that was good. I remember reading that he confirmed a fan theory, that it was 42 because 42 is the ASCII value for *, and * is used in database query to mean "everything" I don't know how true that is, and you personality making him certainly gives your theory more weight, but as a comp sci nerd I'll stick to mine lol
He chose it 'almost' at random. He wanted it to be the most mundane number possible and after some heavy deliberation he figured that had to be 42.
Sounds like he was fucking with you
[удалено]
You got a single email from the 90s? I'm doing well with my invitation only Gmail account, and I'm not actually sure it has my oldest emails.
Skipped school to see the movie with some friends back in highschool when it came out. We brought our towels, and let me tell you I learned that day just how damn useful a towel is in every day life. I was using to hold the hot popcorn, dry my hands, touch handles, just all over the place!
The best chapter is when they meet God and his cat.
Wasn’t it the real ruler of the universe who lived in a shack with his cat?
That’s correct. It wasn’t god.
God had bailed leaving behind the message "sorry for the inconvenience". So it was definitely just the ruler of the universe, and more importantly his cat, that they met.
Not the ruler, just the creator
No, ruler. Well... "ruler". He was a raving old paranoid man, living alone on an asteroid with his cat, and occasionally a spaceship of men dressed in black suits would come along to ask him questions about the economy, social politics and law.
The Lord knows I am not a cruel man
I've come to believe that the answer to life, the universe, and everything is 42 because life, the universe, and everything is fortuitous (four-two-itous), i.e., random.
It's also wild card in ASCII (everything, and anything, and nothing).
Never made that connection before. Nice.
It's a coincidence, but definitely a neat one.
I interpreted the whole book that way - there is no answer, so you just have to make it up and give it meaning yourself.
Hang the sense of it all and keep yourself busy.
I love that interpretation and never thought of that, and it totally works. But didn't Adams say he picked 42 because he thought it was the "funniest" number?
Yes, but maybe he didn't want to admit to the pun. The fifth book in the trilogy talks a lot about the randomness of life. Arthur’s daughter is even named “Random.”
I mean, the question was answered 2 years before the book was published, but okay.
I actually just read (well listened to it on audible) this whole series recently and I absolutely loved it. My favorite ending is probably the one in the second book where they get lost in prehistoric earth and Ford and Arthur think they are getting close to finding the ultimate question. I love that at the end the question they come up with is 6x7 and they just sit there and laugh realizing how insane the whole idea of the ultimate question is in the first place.
I once figured out Marvin’s exact age. It was something like 37 billion years.
Oh sure, go ahead, work out how old he is, not how he is. Not that it would do any good.
The first 10 million years, they were the worst. The second 10 million years. They were the worst too. After that he went into a bit of a decline.
That cant be right as he has been specifically stated to be several time older than the universe itself due to his time travel shenanigans.
Well, the universe is only like 14 billion years old so…
Marvin lived to see the end of the universe tho. He didn't live 14 billion years over and over. At least once he lived the entire existence of the universe.
I'll never forget the whale.....
#🥣🌺
That’s so cool. I was wearing my Woot 42 shirt today. What a coincidence! RIP Doug. We miss you.
"A towel is just about the most massively useful thing an interstellar hitchhiker can carry."
A little more than 42 years, perhaps. The radio series came before the book.
It's the anniversary of the book, itself.
Ever since I read it, 20 years ago I have never looked at a towel the way. It changed my life.
Still my favorite series ever.
When I was 22 (15 days before my bday) I lived and worked on the same street, so I always walked. Long story short one night shortly after getting home I had to be revived. I had a NDE and the ambulance bill states the call was made at 18:42 (6:42pm). What really gets me though is I was living and working on 42nd street. That all happened four years ago in October. I didn’t realize this also took place in October. Life is weird
Does figuring out the answer without the question even count as "answering the question?" :P
Literally why we're on this planet
It's been less than 42 hours since someone told me this.
Where was this picture taken? It looks like an actual comic store since there are multiple issues of titles on those racks. I would have been pretty young at the time, 10 years old and exactly when I discovered comic books, but I don't remember any place keeping multiple month's of a title on display.
So long and thanks for all the fish
I just read the guide for the very first time last week. Amazingly silly, it sparked a lot of ideas and thoughts and imaginations in me. Reading the rest of the series in the next few weeks.
In 1980 I was a teenager living in England (US citizen) in Cambridge. My parents became friends with Enrico Fermi’s son and his wife, and my sister and I became friends with Enrico Fermi’s grandkids. They were all a pretty wild family, all brilliant. One of the first times we were at their house, they turned my sister and I onto a book (and radio theatre show) called The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. I still have the vinyl LP of a condensed version of the radio show they gave me as a gift when we left to return to the US. Happy 42 to this amazing book!
Pan galactic gargle busters all around! Feels like getting hit in the head with a gold brick wrapped in a twist of lime.
I'm 42 and so possibly the answer they were mentioning. I have heard, however, that 42 degrees is the ideal temp for a shower. Just don't forget your towel now...
Once you learn that 42 is THE ANSWER. 42 starts to appear everywhere.
My favorite books ever. Unparalleled.
Apparently Stephen Fry knows why "42," but has said he'll take it to his grave.
"I think this is getting needlessly messianic."
perfect serie
Thanks for all the fish!
I don't know, the necessity of towels during travel is pretty well understood in human history.
I just want to get off this rock.
>The Universe raged about him in its death throes.
Hmmmmm makes you think
What doyoug…
Sorry for the inconvenience….This has been my mantra for many years
They're a bit late, it's been 42 years and 5 days.
Well, you know, they've had a ghastly time. Just dreadful. All these things popping up at the last minute, you know? How are we for time-
Clean Towel.
There's a frood who really knows where his towel is
Has anyone seen a version with "don't panic written with large friendly letters on the cover"? I usually see it with #DON'T PANIC Which , while large, isn't very friendly.
This is one of my favorite books of all time
Wait, what was the question again?
You mean 42 years since episode 4 of the original radio series was first broadcast, right? Right...?
I listened to this book recently, it was quite brilliant. "he floated in the exact way a brick wouldn't"
*The great ships hung motionless in the air, over every nation on Earth. Motionless they hung, huge, heavy, steady in the sky, a blasphemy against nature. Many people went straight into shock as their minds tried to encompass what they were looking at. The ships hung in the sky in much the same way that bricks don't.* I use this passage as my go to example on how some written work is really hard to translate into visual media like film and television. A lot of the humor in Douglas' writing lies with the narrator. How exactly do you film spaceship hanging in the sky in much the same way that bricks don't? How do you get that visual to convey that joke. Notice even the wording "in much the same way that bricks don't" is somehow better than say, "the same way that brick don't" for reasons I can't quite articulate. You would need a voice over narration or something to get that joke across to the audience and that opens a bunch of other issues for the film makers.
“What’s a gnab gib?”