Truthful Tuesday

This week was difficult. I wanted to think of something personal, and creative to put on here. Something intelligent, and insightful.

Well anyway, that didn't happen. So instead, you get to find out something slightly lame, and a little bit quirky.

I.......like science fiction! I know, who would have ever guessed! I am currently reading The Restaurant at the End of the Universe, and The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul, by Douglas Adams.

First, a little background information on the book. The introduction goes something like this:

The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy — not an Earth book, never published on Earth, and until the terrible catastrophe occurred, never seen or heard of by any Earthman. Nevertheless, a wholly remarkable book. in fact it was probably the most remarkable book ever to come out of the great publishing houses of Ursa Minor — of which no Earthman had ever heard either. Not only is it a wholly remarkable book, it is also a highly successful one — more popular than the Celestial Home Care Omnibus, better selling than Fifty More Things to do in Zero Gravity, and more controversial than Oolon Colluphid's trilogy of philosophical blockbusters Where God Went Wrong, Some More of God's Greatest Mistakes and Who is this God Person Anyway? In many of the more relaxed civilizations on the Outer Eastern Rim of the Galaxy, the Hitch Hiker's Guide has already supplanted the great Encyclopedia Galactica as the standard repository of all knowledge and wisdom, for though it has many omissions and contains much that is apocryphal, or at least wildly inaccurate, it scores over the older, more pedestrian work in two important respects. First, it is slightly cheaper; and secondly it has the words Don't Panic inscribed in large friendly letters on its cover.

Now that you have a basis for the book, I would like to continue by stating that I do think this series is a classic. I believe a book can be called a classic if it is timeless. I know this to be true in the present situation because you can simply change the quote a bit, and it goes something like this...

"If human beings don't keep Facebooking, their brains will start working!"

Since you are probably a little confused, let me now insert the actual quote.

"It is worth repeating at this point the theories that Ford had come up with, on his first encounter with human beings, to account for their peculiar habit of continually stating and restating the very, very obvious, as in "It's a nice day," or "You're very tall," or "So this is it, we're going to die".His first theory was that if human beings didn't keep exercising their lips, their mouths probably seized up.After a few months of observation he had come up with a second theory, which was this - "If human beings don't keep exercising their lips, their brains start working".In fact, this second theory is more literally true of the Belcerebon people of Kakrafoon.The Belcerebon people used to cause great resentment and insecurity amongst neighboring races by being one of the most enlightened, accomplished, and above all quiet civilizations in the Galaxy. As a punishment for this behavior, which was held to be offensively self righteous and provocative, a Galactic Tribunal inflicted on them that most cruel of all social diseases, telepathy. Consequently, in order to prevent themselves broadcasting every slightest thought that crosses their minds to anyone within a five mile radius, they now have to talk very loudly and continuously about the weather, their little aches and pains, the match this afternoon and what a noisy place Kakrafoon has suddenly become."

My true hope is that this post convinces one of you to read the book, because then I will have someone to talk about it with! If this goal is reached, I will truly be able to say this was a successful Truthful Tuesday :)