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

84Xth Conversation Notes.

Welcome to the Atelier! If this is your first visit, please do stop by our forum page at A304354 and read about us; it might help you make sense of the place you’ve come to. Or not. There’s a link to further backstory, illustrations and a floor plan, too.

Here we are at Conversation 85X. We are by now an institution, rather like the venerable and slightly dotty ancestor to whom your parents make annual pilgrimage. Despite our apparent gravitas, we hide sweets about the parlor and tell politically incorrect jokes that scandalize your mother.

Hypatia has been our scribe for the most recent conversation, and she scribed so well, so eloquently, that she has left me little to do except hand out a few awards then unveil her contribution, quite unedited by your hostess. *Chloe steps forward proffering a quill pen with white plumes, set in a cunning model of Bob’s Rock* Our thanks to Hypatia for her work, and for her invaluable contributions to the atelier and to Hootoo.

Ottox has been awarded the honorary B4-I-Wake cattle prod, for last to the forum. *Chloe hands over a cattle prod (sans batteries) fashioned from wood with marquetry in the handle and silk leaves sprouting from the taser ends* This ends a run of awards for the Cattle Prod's inventor, B4, the Bookworm from Betelgeuse, whose presence we miss these days.

And now to Hypatia's notes!

Matina was kept busy baking last conversation. FG, Ormy, Joanna, Munchkin, Mr. Dreadful and Ben all had birthdays. And Agapanthus and Scrumpf celebrated their first wedding anniversary. In addition, there were the annual hot cross buns to make for the Lenten season.

We welcomed the return of several old friends to the Salon. Egon, SpaceCadette, Gw7en, Grey Desk, Strangely Strange and Ottox all happily reappeared. We also welcomed Wilma Neanderthal and Not him (? is this an alter ego?) to the Salon. Both joined in the conversation for the first time.

In personal notes, we had several salonistas under the weather with general lurgy, bad backs, migraines and nosebleeds. Hati finished up a year and a half of dental work. GDZ got his first tattoo, Z and Mol both started dream jobs, and David B was a grand success in his role in “Me and My Girl”. One reviewer described his performance as brilliant. Lil finished the illustrations for a series of children’s books and posted a link so we could all enjoy them. Phil won a digital camera at work and Bagpuss had an accident with his forklift. Kerr’s local pub was purchased and closed, Bagpuss won an auction, but had to pay with second class stamps and Mr. Dreadful was kept busy making chain mail.

Teuchter’s heating system left her in the cold, and later she lost and then recovered her heirloom engagement ring. Amy spend part of the conversation with not one, but two offices, but the new one does not allow trash cans. Lentilla stayed busy making masks for the Scarborough Faire Ren Fest. Lil got a new roof and a new window, but had two scares, first when her friend Nora had a stroke and next when she ran over Cille’s dog. Both Nora and the dog are recovering.

There was so much coming and going by salonistas that it was hard to keep track. tartaronne flew to Stockholm on business and met up with Titania. There was a mini-meet in Copenhagen attended by Hati, Santra, and tartaronne. The same weekend, Z, Ben, and Teuchter flew to Seville for another mini-meet. Marv traveled to Miami and Lady C went to Kansas City. Santra flew to Paris. The prize for the longest trip goes to Phil and Metal Chicken who flew to Turkey. Phil returned with some wonderful photos of the solar eclipse. No one went to Poona.

Conversation topics were many and varied. They included Dr. Who; teaching methods and overly structured curricula; house and kitchen remodeling (Witty has her own version of This Old House going); university strikes; tourists and cathedrals; car insurance; how to kill a mole; Barbie, the Musical; Moebius strips; drinks with offensive names; St. Patrick and cherubim; telemarketers and how to get rid of them; gumbo and ox-tail soup; dishonest tradesmen; 7-year old’s wearing makeup;welfare and unemployment; the proper way to eat Peeps; the great diversity of salonistas and our experiences; the Princess Bride and the Green Man Legends.



And that concludes Hypatia’s reprise of the most recent conversation. Onward! Chloe has cleaned the salon and disabled all the orange buttons on the furniture. Matina has refreshed the samovar and the coffeepot, and there are fresh cinnamon buns awaiting us. Please come in and join in a new conversation.

Yipee

I don't believe it I've gone and got here first. After being missing in action for all of the last 84Xth and most of the 83Xth thread.

Please excuse me. I've not had access at home for most of that time and was going through a trying time emmotionally. But I'm back and hope to keep up with the current Atelier thread.

*Matina comes out of the kitchen bearing an Irish coffee in an FTTF mug, that she nearly drops at the sight of DD*

*she recovers and nods, then gives DD the mug*

darn it

*cathces FTTF mug*

Thanks Matina.

*sups*

Made with Bushmills Special Reserve as well. Very nice get out hte good stuff for my first FTTF mug. After all these years I'll savour this.

Sorry SE

I love the smell of a fresh convo in the morning.

Well, at least I'm on the first LED this time.

*rushes in*

Ecellent scribing, Hypatia - I hadn't realised how much we had covered in 84X.

B

{Teuchter}

Is broken heating catching? My central heating's gone all shy, though I do seem to still have hot water, which has a separate boiler for some reason.

Mmmm. At least I've got time to save up some pennies between now and September and get it fixed then.

B

This is the first day I haven't been cold inside my house, thanks to the weather having improved.
The heating still isn't fixed - still waiting for colin the Plumber to deal with his previous committments.

Great scribing, Hypatia.

Waiting for No 1 Daughter to arrive. She starts her new teaching job tomorrow at a college near Teuchter Towers.

*wanders off muttering 'How did I suddenly get old enough to have a daughter who's a lecturer'

Ooh, first page. Look at all these empty seats.

*spends a while deciding which is the most comfortable-looking chair*

Hyp, you just had to remind me about scratching that forklift, didn't you?

Did I mention our boiler's on the blink as well? Sadly the warm day doesn't help, as its problem is with producing hot water for the taps - it copes with radiators just fine. What is it with plumbers? I fail to see how they make any money when they fail to turn up and do the work.

*comes back from mailing her IRS check and feeding some apples to the horses in the back yard*

*Enters with black nails and dirt on her knees from an hour of liberating the strawberry plants from grass and weeds. *

I've missed some of the blog, I detect from Hypatia's scribing.

*Rushes out to wash hands and change clothes. Returns at a dignified pace. Pours a big mug of , lines it with whiskey and snuggles up in one of the tall and deep chairs.*

Hi

[Lady C.]

First LED. Whew!

*Comes in carrying a rucksack, from which she proceeds to unload a bunch of rosemary, a bunch of lovage, and bunch of bronze fennel, a very large bunch of daffodils, a bunch of snakes' head fritillary (only pickable for Salonistas, as otherwise it is a protected species), and several bunches of wild violets*

Hello DD! Nice to see you again.

I'm back from the Sticks and therefore able to whisk myself over here whenever I feel like it (rather than waiting for a strange gap after supper when everyone else is watching snooker and/ or kvetching about having to watch snooker). Oh, and my In-Laws have THE most uncomfortable spare bed in the history of Britain.

*relaxes into a sofa and dozes off*

That's a good subject for a discussion, Ag. What's the most uncomfortable night any of you ever spent, excluding actually camping out?

Any volunteers to scribe? Ben and Hypatia have done the most recent honors.

*thinks about the topic Ag raised*