Tag Archives: book

22-Anic

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Far Out

Elon Musk’s Tesla Roadster (February 2018)
  • The Hitchhiker’s Guide
    to the Galaxy – 1979
     
  • The Restaurant
    at the End of the Universe – 1980
     
  • Life, the Universe
    and Everything – 1982
     
  • So Long, and Thanks
    for All the Fish – 1984
     
  • Mostly Harmless – 1992

The Hitchhiker series by Douglas Adams follows the adventures of the last surviving man, Arthur Dent, after the demolition of the Earth by a Vogon constructor fleet to make way for a hyperspace bypass.

Arthur Dent is rescued from destruction on Earth by escaping, ironically, on a passing Vogon spacecraft with Ford Prefect, a human-like alien writer for the namesake electronic travel guide.

He explores the galaxy with Prefect and eventually encounters another human, Trillian, a beautiful woman who had also escaped Earth in the nick of time.

Other characters include the two-headed President of the Galaxy, Zaphod Beeblebrox, and a depressed and paranoid android robot, Marvin.

MOSTLY HARMLESS

Update April 22, 2023: Back to Bizarro Land, again. I had been told to exercise (not walk in dark until I dropped); more precisely: do yoga. continue

18-File

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Bibliotheca

Reading Books by Roz Chast

Things form in my brain. They get bigger & bigger until I must write them down to free up some space in my head.

It’s the same way a chicken lays an egg. When people eat that egg, the chicken is probably thinking, Really? You like that? It just came out of my butt.

Mike Reiss in Springfield Confidential

02-Ject

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Psychosis

Faked or Flawed

“Computer,” said Zaphod, “tell us again what our present trajectory is.”

“A real pleasure, feller,” it burbled, “we are currently in orbit at an altitude of 300 miles around the legendary planet of Magrathea.”

“Proving nothing,” said Ford. “I wouldn’t trust that computer to speak my weight.”

“I can do that for you, sure,” enthused the computer, punching out more tickertape. “I can even work out your personality problems to 10 decimal places if it will help.”

Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams (1979)

11-Xpan

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Wilderness

Out here by myself in 2016 at a place almost totally inaccessible to normal people. Motorcycle stuck on that hill for several hours. There’s no water! Nowadays I stay home, look at the picture.
Trinity College Library, Dublin (abundant resources and signs of humanity)

He turned to Stephen and said:

—Seriously, Dedalus. I’m stony. Hurry out to your school kip and bring us back some money.

—That reminds me, Haines said, rising, that I have to visit your national library today.

—Our swim first, Buck Mulligan said.”

Ulysses by James Joyce

12-Baph

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Meteorological

How much energy could be harvested from this string of lightning strikes?

On March 27th, 2021, a series of severe thunderstorms crossed middle Tennessee, causing widespread flooding and putting on an impressive lightning show.

While most of the lightning stayed up in the clouds, the occasional bolt went to ground, and “cloud crawlers” put on a spectacular display every so often, too.

Which famous son* of a famous father preferred to spend the night of his old man’s celebrations brawling in a bar five hundred yards from the party, rather than hobnobbing with his family?

Our spies tell us a punch was thrown, and his faithful assistant was unable to Hold It Back. A father-son competition for publicity? Dad definitely won this round.

*As Hold It Back was the name of one of Jonny Rokeby‘s albums, nobody could really be in much doubt which father and son were in question.

Troubled Blood by Robert Galbraith

From cover of THOMAS MANN – DOCTOR FAUSTUS

11-Pulp

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Oceanography

Out of the Deeps by John Wyndham
(1st published 1953 England as The Kraken Wakes)

In this novel forty-one million Englishmen die, but it is only suggested through the hardships of one couple.”

Richard H. Tyre – emphasising that effective writing involves understatement.

Men will gain infinitely more knowledge, insight, and eventually more products, from mastering the depths of the sea than from spending billions more trying to achieve conquest of sterile space.”

Jacques Yves Cousteau [all wet]

Haunting the seas from Norway through Iceland and all the way to Greenland, the Kraken would attack vessels with its strong arms, and having a taste for human flesh would devour the ship’s entire crew at once.

Release The Kraken!

05-Ount

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Witchcraft

Coastland & Curtner by Joe

Halloween Will Be Here Soon

EDGAR 

Come on, sir. Here’s the place. Stand still. 

How fearful and dizzy ’tis to cast one’s eyes so low!

The crows and choughs that wing the midway air show scarce so gross as beetles.

GLOUCESTER 

Set me where you stand.

King Lear (Act 4, scene 6, by Shakespeare)