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

FYI, Courtesy's brother is now dw2

I have a new nickname. After a polite email from the DNA Moderation Team informing me that "Your Nickname 'DNA' has been changed back to 'Researcher 231925', since it contravenes the House Rules," I have changed my nickname to dw2.

I didn't realize the special significance of DNA until I read ABCB's personal space. My use of it arose years ago out of a repetitious typing mistake.

I really am sorry, don't hate me! (ok, I'm better now)

No probs here, dw2. In lower case I thought of it as deoxyribonucleic acid, the other dna

Ben, I liked the quilt too, it echoes the arm enfolding bit.

We are going into the car dealership tomorrow morning, so far they have agreed to the price.

Good luck!

Caerwynn,

That was actually the intent. It started that I kept thinking faster than I could type and I would mix up Dan. The more I did it the more I thought about the humor of it. A name is an identity, it is part of what defines us as a person and gives us some measure of individuality.

But names get repeated in different places and times. Even more than a name, our dna defines us as an individual regardless of where (or when) we are.

unless you're an identical twin...

What a great story, Garius. You're a lot more persevering than I am.

Amy, I saw the Atled/Delta thing, but I just wondered if there was also a backstory, as is so often the case with researcher names.

dw, I ~did~ wonder about you having the name 'dna'. I had presumed that they had retired that name, as one would a shirt number once a stellar player has retired.

I've been fooling around with this Speed Graphic. It has two shutters! The lens has the usual iris shutter, but additionally there's a curtain shutter between the bellows and the film plate. I could touch the back side of the lens (but I didn't). So quaint!

GL - after w*rking several years 'behind the counter' at front office desks at hotels, my experience that there are people that always have to follow the rules into each minimal unimportant detail and always need to feel that they are right and the other party is wrong (on either side of the counter) - but this is not exclusive to the hotel business. in Sweden we call them 'paragraph riders' and unfortunately you'll be able to find them anywhere, everywhere...

I was initially slightly alarmed by Z's ing at the end of the last page, until I read the postings properly. I really must learn not to speed read the backlog.

dw2 - so you got modded for nickname abuse. Well done Most of us had to include the words "oil", "for", "war", and "no" into our names to get that honour

Alted/Delta? Do we have a police call sign fetish going on around here or something? We've got a Whisky and a Tango out there already. So all we need now is a researcher called Foxtrot and we've got the set

dw, One must also consider that our DNA sequencing is also derivative. We get the sequences from our parents and each pair of sequences reacts with differently. So while it is a unique sequence per person, it also is a blend of two other people.

Marv,

Ah the "nobody is an island, and we are all interrelated and interdependent" philosophy. I like it.

Lil,

That's really cool. I love old cameras and have a couple myself. Is yours the 4x5 or the 2-1/4 x 3-1/4?

[:x - ]

U185282

So, was the first U# 000001 and did it belong to dna? And we're approaching the quarter million mark on U#s. I wonder how many active researchers there are?

Sorry, should have said that U185282 is Foxtrot.

Approriately, Douglas Adams is U42.

U1 is the mysterious slacker, DNA himself nabbed U42.

I think it's been pretty firmly estimated that there's a maximum of about 20,000 active registered researchers (my educated guess is six to ten thousand), particulary when we look at article numbers which are only up to about 100,000, so there's not that many personal spaces.

The site's definately got more people now than it used to, the online list is now regulary at 100 for most of the day, which is great!

spelugx --

[fg, a remarkably unactive researcher, especially after a big lunch]

Actually, I've very pleased with my U#. It's U200042. But when I checked, there have been other Hypatias. And I thought I was being original. Oh, well. At least the moderation team didn't make me change it.

Poor Cassie had a fight with one of the Siamese. She was unhurt in spite of what seemed to be huge quantities of fur flying around the garden! She was shaking for sometime afterwards though and is now on her favourite windowsill, over the stairs and showing no interest in spending the night outdoors.

Foxtrot is not nearly as much fun without Oscar . I can remember Dad teaching us the call signs when all we wanted to do was play Battleships on squared paper. When No1 son had set of walkie talkies for Xmas one year, he taught him radio ettiquette, it may come in handy one day!

[BC gasping for air, winded from having to go through so much backlog, and trying to remember the names of all the new people]

Y'all are a talkative bunch ! DW, I'm glad you clarified that you are actually dna- I was starting to get confused !

Bryce, you are perpetually confused