h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I was visiting your page for another reason, and saw that you like Samuel Clemens. I thought you might like to know that he's one of my relatives. A distant cousin or something, I could find out exactly, but that will have to wait, because at the moment that would entail waking up my mother, which is not a good idea.

Cool. I'm not related to him or anything, but we both see things pretty much the same, and I love his style of humor. I've even used a few of his archaic sayings, which give me an internal laugh but leave my audience staring at me like I'm some sort of freak. I even ripped off one of his lines in another article I wrote, the one on Los Angeles, where I said 'you can't throw a rock in any direction without hitting a Mexican food joint.' Can't recall where I lifted the 'can't throw a rock' metaphor from exactly, but I know it's his.

BTW, don't bother checking for that line in the approved version. Like everything else I liked about that article, it got axed, to be replaced by some filler in the form of a list of local attractions that clearly came from an encyclopedia, since nobody ever goes there.

No one ever goes to Los Angeles? Or your article? I'll go read it and post something relevant. But it won't be about any place I've been there, because I haven't.

I like Mark Twain. I haven't read any of the famous stuff since I was little. The only thing of his I own is The Diary of Adam and Eve, and I re-read that just a couple of weeks ago.

For pure humor value, I recommend a collection of his short works. Make sure it contains the following:

'Fennimore Cooper's Literary Offences' - A scathing review that Cooper richly deserves. Asteroid Lil, the other Twainophile on this site, finds this one to be her favorite as well.

'Private History of a Campaign That Failed' - Twain's personal memoirs of the earliest days of the Civil War. And you thought war wasn't hilarious....

'Little Bessie' - A little girl asks religious questions her mother can't quite answer.

'Pudd'nhead Wilson's Calendar' - A collection of proverbs. Very quotable.

His best novel, in my opinion, is 'A Conneticutt(sp?) Yankee in King Arthur's Court.' If you've read this one before as a kid, I recommend you do so again. Too much political stuff going on here that would have been over your head.