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So Long, Hitchhiker: Douglas Adams Dead At 49
Motor was among the first of the hundreds of readers with this sad news: "Douglas Adams, author of the Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy
has died of a heart attack, aged 49." I still remember the first time someone pointed out the Hitchiker's Guide to me, and what a changing point even the first few pages were. It's easy to see he'll be missed.
And me with this terrible pain in all the diodes down my left side.
Oh God, I'm so depressed...
Given that this sad news follows not so long after the discussion about how many hour a week do you geeks all work, I'd just like to say:
That could be you at age 49, too.
So perhaps all you sixty-hour work-lifers should think about it. Before you get a chance to enjoy life, it could be over.
He leaves behind a wife and a seven year-old daughter. The people that were most important to him, and who he was most important to. Poof! Their Douglas is irrevocably gone from their lives.
I'm not saying everyone should become completely hedonistic and live only for the moment... but you gotta make sure that you do get to live.
Out of respect for the people who care for you, take a few minutes to assess your life. Make sure that you've got a good balance between work, family, and play. Make it a life worth living.
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Don't like it? Respond with words, not karma.
Nah...he missed yet another deadline... :)
"The thing I love most about deadlines is the wonderful WHOOSHing sound they make as they go past." - Douglas Adams.
My journal has hot
#define NINE 8 + 1
#define SIX 1 + 5
int main() {
printf("%i times %i is %i\n", SIX, NINE, SIX * NINE);
return 0;
}
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We apologise for the inconvenience.
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Brazil has decided you're cute.
They gazed at God's Final Message in wonderment, and were slowly and ineffably filled with a great sense of peace, and of final and complete understanding.
Fenchruch sighed. 'Yes,' she said, 'that was it.'
They had been staring at ut for fully ten minutes before they became aware that Marvin, hanging between their shoulders, was in difficulties. The robot could no longer lift his head, had not read the message. They lifted his head, but he complained that his vision circuits had almost gone.
They found a coin and helped him to the telescope. He complained and insulted them, but they helped him look at each individual letter in turn. The first letter was a 'w', the second an 'e'. Then there was a gap. An 'a' follow, then a 'p', an 'o' and an 'l'.
Marvin paused for a rest. After a few moments they resumed and let him see the 'o', the 'g', the 'i', the 's', and the 'e'.
The next two words were 'for' and 'the'. The last one was a long on, and Marvin needed another rest before he could tackle it.
It started with 'i', then 'n' then a 'c'. Next came an 'o' and an 'n', followed by a 'v', an 'e', another 'n', and an 'i'.
After a final pause, Marvin gathered his strength for the last stretch.
He read the 'e', the 'n', the 'c' and at last the final 'e', and staggered back into their arms.
'I think', he muttered at last, from deep within his corroding rattling thorax, 'I feel good about it.'
The lights went out in his eyes for absolutely the very last time ever.
Luckily, there was a stall nearby where you could rent scooters from guys with green wings.
That pretty much describes the events of today.
Douglas Adams had an uncanny sense of wit... one that most authors would give a lung and a kidney just to have for one novel. Although the "Dirk Gently" books never quite caught on with me, I do own all 5 Hitchhiker's Trilogy books (yes, an increasingly inappropriately named trilogy... and yes, the leather bound version) and they rank among the top 10 books/authors I have ever read. There is something quite upsetting about someone dying this young, someone with so much creative force left in him, but his contributions to our souls and to all of pop culture will exist forever and ever. We will never lose them.
The feeling is not entirely unlike Arthur Dent's feeling after losing Fenchurch in a hyperspace jump, though. This is beyond unexpected, and there's a feeling of helplessness as well. Plus, we all want to see that movie made the RIGHT way, and eventually I want to be carrying around my "Don't Panic" PDA. Palm might generate great business by selling one of its' wireless access models with those words on the cover, as a tribute.
I might add that I have two favorite authors, and I expected one of them to be dead any time soon now... except the other died extremely unexpectedly, and the other isn't getting any younger. So, someone, please, call and find out how Kurt Vonnegut Jr. is feeling today...
I guess this means no resolution to the loose ends from "Young Zaphod Plays It Safe" and no movie.
Unfortunately, it probably means that the movie will finally be made, badly.
I think that the reason we haven't seen it yet is that he never got the movie deal that he wanted in terms of control. (I can just see studio execs now "This Marvin is all wrong, too depressing for a comedy, we think he should be more of a 'surfer dude.'" or "Slartibartfast is not going to work for marketing tie-ins. We are thinking more of a furry E.T. named 'Giget.'") Ugh.
-Peter
So is the answer 49 then?
Freevo - Linux Multimedia Jukebox
(I've just finished reading "So long, and thanks for all the fish" yesterday. I feel really sad.)
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He helped create the first "hit" computer game based on a novel, helped ignite the whole "books on tape" trend, brought his stories to radio and television, helped create the rich, computerized environment of "Starship Titanic" and the concept of a "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy"--a massive collection of obscure hyperlinked information (before the www existed) displayed on a small handheld computer (before PDAs existed). He also created the idea of the babel fish--a universal translator, essentially. Just by writing a good yarn, he helped spur change in the world around him that has benefited all of us. We all owe a lot to the guy and to the kind of changes that one "good read" can bring. Thanks, Doug.
It is made pretty clear in context (and from later books) that this is the WRONG question. Arthur is descended from the Golgofrinchams, not from the original caveman inhabitants of Earth (who were the ones actually determining the Question), so he doesn't have the correct Question. The Earth program was irrevocably screwed up when the Golg. colonized Earth, more or less wiping out the cavemen.
When I was in high school, a friend of mine who was very smart (and had much too much time on his hands) figured out that six times nine does equal 42 -- provided you do it in base 13.
Douglas Adams himself once actually said in relation to this matter: "Nobody writes jokes in base 13."
ASA
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All employees must wash hands before seeking equitable relief.
He will be sorely missed.
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Friends don't let friends use multiple inheritance.
Knowing Adam's inability to meet deadlines (if you'll pardon the word), it seems such an irony that he finally did something early. For those attending his funeral, be prepared for a long wait, as he is expected to be late.
So long, and Thanks.
StuP
"The thing I love most about deadlines is the wonderful WHOOSHing sound they make as they go past" - DNA
Dave
To this day I still use this one -
Me: It's at times like this I wish I'd listened to what my mother told me when I was young.
Unsuspecting victim: Why what did she say?
Me: I don't know I wasn't listening!
Maybe I'm just an old geek but it still make me laugh every time.
Thanks Douglas for my favourite joke.
As a tribute, we should all fly our towels at half mast today...
On a more serious note, I will never forget the day I walked into the school library to see the new paperbacks that arrived and the strange book that was sitting near the front of the stack.
At first, I was not sure what to make of it, the title seemed to imply Science Fiction, but the cover, with a strange impish green face sticking its tongue out and cartoonish artwork seemed to imply humor. Still, something about it appealed to me, so I went to a secluded corner to check it out.
What I had not counted on was the addictive nature of this book. It seemed silly and pointless, but I could not put it down. After I read that last line "Okay, baby, hold tight," said Zaphod. "We'll take in a quick bite at the Restaurant at the End of the Universe", I could only think of two things. First, where (or when) would the next book be available, and how could I explain having missed the last three periods of school!
That book, was of course the Hitchhicker's Guide to the Galaxy, and that paperback was later bought by me at a school library sale. It has been with me for over a decade, traveled to 24 countries on 4 continents, and although dog-eared and tattered, remains a treasured part of my collection.
Thank you Mr Douglas, for making fun of our flaws and obsessions, and helping us to laugh at ourselves. From Arthur to Zaphod, and everyone in-between, you have made, at least for me, life a richer experience. You will be missed.
I think I shall honor Mr Douglas in the fashion he would have liked best, by sitting back, curling up with the Guide, and letting his magic touch me again.
"To travel the paths of human imagination you have to be willing to unlearn all you know"
"Hovered in the air the way bricks don't".
Maybe he's just spending a year dead for tax reasons.
End of lesson. You may press the button.
If you measure a person's value by the happiness they bring to others then we are an immensely poorer world today.
I remember reading the Hitchiker's Guide as a teenager, after watching the BBC series. I was absolutely blown away. What's more amazing is that no matter how many times I re-read those books or how old I get, I am still as amazed with them.
To me, HHGTTG represents the best of satire; it pokes fun at human foibles and failings without ever losing an underlying feeling of good humour. A difficult balancing act.
Oh, yeah. So Long, and thanks for the nick and the .sig, Mr. Adams...
"Douglas Adams is dead. But Jack Valenti goes on and on and on..."
I know... Oolon Coluphid could write a new book on that subject "How God is an Unfair Bastard"
=== The price of freedom is eternal vigilance
No problem, just replace "www" by "channel", the actual story is at http://channel.nytimes.com/aponline/obituaries/AP- Obit-Adams.html
BTW, anybody compared it to the same obituary by CNN?
Why mod this down as OT, moderator, show some respect yourself! This is a sad loss, not because of further books that remain unwritten now (and I think he buried the trilogy with part five already, can anyone confirm?), but because he was a great entertainer, plus he well deserved to enjoy the global appreciation of his work a little longer...
But somehow dying of a heart attack seems an appropriate finale to me, just don't ask me why.
A World in a Grain of Sand / Heaven in a Wild Flower,
Infinity in the Palm of your Hand / And Eternity in an Hour.