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

{mt}

Mystic Martin is very impressive! Do you feel it was an accurate reading, Amy? Fair enough if you would rather not say.

The heatwave continues and I would much rather not go to the gym, also a lot of tidying up needs to be done following the weekend which I don't fancy doing if it is going to reach 29 again today. Also gettting a letter off expressing our views on the proposed housing development.

Guildford doesn't have the wonderful architecture of other County towns, (Kingston upon Thames is actually the seat of the Surrey County Council) so we don't get inundated by grockles. Even though we have a ruined castle, a modern red brick Cathedral which is beautiful inside and a surpising number of medieval buildings, we get more EFL students than tourists.

It is hard to remember how old a lot of the towns in Southern England really are. They were so thouroughly land-cleared in 1940-45, and so brutally rebuilt in the 1960s that most of them look like New Towns. Reading is probably the clearest example of this. But Bristol and Portsmouth and Plymouth all spring to mind too. When the Germans rebuilt they replicated what was gone, so the city centres of the bombed out German towns still appear to be 18th Century or older.

60 years on, I think I prefer the German approach.

B

Ben, should you be able to make it over to this side of the pond you really should try to make time for the deserts of the American West. I am partial to the land of Southern Utah myself, but any desert is a beautiful place if you look hard enough. Cati in bloom, desert dwellers hunting for sustinance, red cliffs... I could go on.

Best storm? Hmmmm... how about most memorable storm?

I've probably already told you about this in the past, but I'm sure the newer Salonistas haven't heard it, so here we go again:

I was on vacation in Greece (Lefkas) and one day we decided to take one of the small excursion boats to a beach that was a bit hard to reach from land (steep cliffs). The weather was very nice when we set off, but during the journey halfway round the island it started blowing, and clouds began showing up.

We arrived at the beach, which had no landing-stadge - instead the boats (there were several) drove up on the sand, and then you'd climb down a ladder to get to the shore. We had barely started unpacking bags, spreading towels etc. when the crew started shouting at us to get back on board - quick! A storm was blowing up, and the water was rapidly rising. By the time everyone was finally on board again, the water had risen so much that there was almost nothing of the beach leaft, just the rugged cliffs.

And then it started raining. Everyone tried to squeeze into the minimal cabin, but there wasn't enough seats for everyone, so I and a couple of other people were left standing up, hanging on to which ever stable object happened to be within reach. And then the waves came - huge waves, and our small light boat bobbed like a cork - uuuuuup and doooooown, uuuuuuup and doooooown - and soon a lot of people barged out the door out onto the sun deck despite the rain - hanging over the *consults dictionary* gunwale(?) being thoroughly sea .

I tried desperately not to notice (people being sick make *me* feel sick) and tried concentrating on the horizon (whenever I could spot it between the waves) and on keeping my navel (or actually a spot somewhat below it according to Tai Chi) levelled with the horizon. It helped to serve as a distraction, while I was ocassionally loosing my foothald, hanging in my arms feeling like a monkey (the floor was sloping a *lot* going up- and downhill).

And then we stopped. It turned out that one of the boats had engine trouble and was helplessly drifting towards the cliffs and sending out emergency signals - our boat was the only one within sight, except for a big car ferry. We turned back, threw a rope to the other boat, and started tugging it - and then the rope snapped! The car ferry drew cautiously closer to see if additional help was needed, while a second, thicker rope was thrown over - but soon that rope snapped too!

A final attempt was made (had to be the last one, since we were *very* close to the cliffs now) and this time two thick ropes were thrown over, and then our boat started pulling - bit by bit, v-e-r-y slowly - and thanks to the weight of the other boat we stopped bobbing up and down so much - which wasn't of much comfort to my friend, who had thrown up over her shirt.

Well, me made it safe and sound into a harbour nearby, which we soon left, because the storm was gone as fast as it had showed up. The sky cleared up and the sun was shining again, but we didn't go back to the beach - no one was really in the mood for sunbathing any more...

Most impressive storm? Probably when I was working the summer on a Boy Scout camp in NH. There were several (as is normal there) and just sitting on the crowded verandah watching the storm play out over the lake below us was great fun. As was a few of us going down to the chapel, a small wooden roof over some hard standing down by the lake shore, and staying there for as long as possible before deciding to run back to the main camp areas in the rain.
Hmmm I wonder where all the photos from that trip have been put in the intervening 10 years...

Off to the hospital. I may get to bring him home today. <fingerscrossed) smiley

I've caught up with the backlog.

My eyesight took a long time to stabilise this morning. It must be the pressure.

I hope you can spring Frank from the hospital today, Hypatia.

Lil, well done on selling some of your work. I look forward to seeing the photos of the exhibition. I haven't exhibited for ages - I must do something about that.

I have two storm stories for you. The most impressive storm I've seen was one that my mother and I watched rolling in from the Arabian Sea (not the Gulf, the bit at the top of the Indian Ocean). It was seven in the morning and we sat having breakfast at the window of my mother's hotel room. We could see the storm coming and were resigned to staying in but for some reason some of the other guests hadn't noticed and we watched in fascination as they nipped out to put their towels on the sunbeds in order to reserve them. The storm raged through about half an hour later and when it cleared everything on the beach, sunbeds, towels and all, were buried beneath new sand dunes that were about two metres high . Everyone was safe though.

The other storm happened when I was seven, nearly eight. We were at the swimming pool when huge drops of rain started to fall. The rain spots on the pavement were more than a couple of inches in diameter (it was in the days before metric ). My parents bundled us up in towels and made us run the mile and a half home. As soon as we got inside, enormous hailstones started to fall. My father, who has quite a history of taking ridiculous risks to protect small investments, decided that he must go and check on the six hens we kept in the back yard. When he came back he brought with him a hailstone the size of a cricket ball .


I'm sincerely hoping Sol has stigmatism and not stigmata. Very different things .

Caer, the reading by Mystic Martin is certainly much longer than I had anticipated. He didn't tell me what I wanted to know so I suppose that's a good sign .

I've just come back from an abortive visit to the doctor's surgery. Last week I saw the doctor and he told me to make an appointment to have a blood test and to have my bp checked. The rottweiler (receptionist) wouldn't let me make one appointment. I had to make one with the phlebotomist for today and one, for Wednesday, with the nurse. When I got there today I found that the 'phlebotomist' was one of the other rottweillers who has (presumably) been retrained. She couldn't find a vein in my right arm, so we tried my left arm. She had one stab, failed to hit gold, and gave up. So now I'm going to have my blood taken on Wednesday when I have my bp checked - an arrangement that I had wanted in the first place and was told I couldn't have.

I'm a dab hand at taking blood .

Pity I couldn't have doen it for you, Amy. I used to do take whole armfuls for research purposes for drug trials. As the tests had to be done at specific intervals and often on elderly patients for e.g. diabetes trials, before being flown to labs in Geneva, I had to get the blood or there was a great fuss and I was very rarely defeated. A couple of times I had to resort to taking it from veins in the foot!

Needless to say my veins play hide and seek with the needle and the GP has greatest difficulty in pinning them down

We used to have huge storms in Singapore and saw some terrific ones in Florida. But none that stood out particularly. I used to love walking through the monsoon, with the rain coming down like stair rods and not so much pattering on the oiled paper umbrella as drumming on it.

No one has ever had trouble taking blood from me before. *shakes antennae in disbelief*

I got all the photos downloaded and prepped last night. Now I have to make the thumbnails and build the webpage.

Amy, sorry you're having trouble with eyesight this morning. Are there galleries in your area where you have contacts that you could use to re-establish your presence?

WANTED: guest thread-initializer for Conversation 5DX.

Moon was huge and orange when it rose last night. We stood in the middle of the road and watched while our pets frolicked around us.

I've never exhibited up here in Yorkshire, Lil. My best bet would be an open exhibition for amateur artists. But I'd better paint a few pictures first .

It is currently 31ºC in the back garden, in the shade

Bournmouth. Tea gardens, rock, and an ice rink...but it was a long time ago. The New Forest is on hand so time out there would be excellent. Lovely little tea shoppe in a village called Minstead. The tea shoppe is called the honey pot....Delicious home make cakes and the cows and ponies often join you.
If the beach is preferred suggest he takes a large handkerchief...either red with white spots or plain white. He must then tie a knot in each corner and place on head. Shorts not neccessary...merely roll up trousers to knee level and wade into sea. If pebbles prove uncomfortable keep both sandals and sox on.
Storms...this is getting like a place namedropping thread. Johannesburg ...Christmas dinner. Pool outside one window, fire hydrant outside the other. the lightening bounced around the house dancing between the pool and the fire hydrant. Eventually it came through the house and traversed the electrics. no one hurt but cold dinner by candlelight...four kids in house so not even a good sex reward!
take care
boots

Lil, if you get no takers by post 1000 (I am assuming that is our target numer anymore) I will take up that challange.

[{Courtesy}]

Thanks, boots.

If he wants to go to the beach, I'll suggest he just observe the indigenous population.

The way you get messed around is unaceptable really Amy
Only wish handing you loobrushes would help
I'm sat here with half my mouth numb after having a filling reworked at the dentist earlier. I hope it wears off by the time of the interview tomorrow .
Why is it that dentists decide they want to have a meaningful conversation AFTER they've started to prod and poke instruments and mirrors into your mouth when you can't say anything?

Because then they really don't have to have a meaningful conversation, Phil!

The canyon storm was the best. The most memorable is when I was five and got picked up by a tornado and deposited onto the top of a 40 foot oak two blocks away, totally uninjured but for a few minor scratches and an absolutely paralyzing fear of tornadoes.

I love a good storm, and one of my storm stories took place during the first few weeks I lived in Montana. I had just moved here from sunny (even in winter) California, and one morning in my new home I awoke to winds howling and -35°F below zero, with the snow flying so fast past the iced-over windows it was a complete white-out just a few feet from the house. I thought "why the hell did I moved to Montana?". Six years later, I woke up on Christmas Day 1996 to find that seven feet of snow had fallen overnight, completely burying my car in the driveway and all roads were closed across the state. I wasn't able to get out of my neighborhood for a few days as the street plowing crew was off for the Christmas holiday, and then they only plowed the important roads, then the less-important, and then finally poor little neighborhoods like mine. Lots of lovely snow, like that, is just fine on days when you don't have to go anywhere.

I have astigmatism too, Sol (thankfully not a stigmata, though ). According to my optomotrist, it comes in handy when you're a long-haul truck driver, because then you can see far distances excellently. However, as I grow older, I will definitely need glasses to read or work on the computer. For those who don't know, astigmatism is when your natural lenses are lemon- or almond-shaped rather than the more normal round-shaped.