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

[GDZ]

well, with any luck FG will be driving thru NorCal on her way to SoCal next June, to watch me get hooded!

I'm only 4-5 hours north of HN, FG, and Notepad will most definitely be here by June... (Faith and I were just talking this afternoon about how Notepad will *not* be born on her birthday) *conveniently ignores that she's not exactly sure where FG lives, but that she did learn that from here to Utah, for instance, takes some interesting routing*

i wanna come over to the states again sometime! suppose it will have to wait untill i have finished uni now, so thats at least another four years!

Wow, Ben. Plumbing in Antarctica would be most challenging! I wonder whether they need librarians from time to time? It sounds rewarding, but a really odd concept, working for the British (or any other nation) Antarctic Survey. / - which also applies to SGV's experience.

Enzymes, eh? We always knew that a sure way to wind up our biology teacher would be to talk about 'killing' enzymes. Heh heh heh.

*checks Ben's link*

'Temperatures average -50oC at the Pole and the world's lowest temperature of -89.7oC has been recorded at the Russian Vostok Station.'

Merci, mais non.

*trying to calculate at which temperature blood freezes*

Blood would freeze at freezing point, surely, (0 centigrade, 32 farenheight). The tortoise trust gets very agitated about letting your tortoise hibernate in places where the temperature might go below freezing because apparently if they don't die their eyes can freeze and they go blind. Ikk.

-50C is cold. The coldest place I've been was the Ice Hotel where it was -35C at night. I remember going in to the hotel proper where it was -10C and thinking "oh, it's warm in here".

Ben

I've been in -51 (Celsius) weather once. That was with the wind, in Minnesota, in December. The brake lines on cars was freezing, and when the train I was on stopped for a freight train, it froze to the tracks. It was estimated that the coldest it got that night was -62. Crazy cold.

i think the coldest i have ever experienced was around -10c i cant thin how cold -50c would be.

I was one of those children who read wildly inappropriate books for my age--and I found them all on my parents' bookshelves. I read Fear of Flying and The Female Eunuch by the age of nine. The parental unit would catch* me reading books like these, and I think their general reaction was, "Whew! Well, at least we got a smart one!"

*(Catch? How about encourage me? They gave me a copy of Shirley Conran's "Lace" for Christmas when I was 12. Can you believe that?)*

<>

I often wonder how I would feel about Judy Blume now if I went back and re-read "Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret". Is it still good?

There was a pre-teen book I never read when I was that age. I can't remember the title for the life of me now, but all the girls in sixth, seventh, and eighth grades passed it around with a smirk on their faces, and kept it from the watchful eyes of adults. It had a LOT to do with drugs; as I remember, it was about a girl who had access to drugs and drink because of lousy parents. She knew a lot about sex for the same reason. It had a hazy photo of a blonde on the cover. Perhaps her name was Alice? Does anyone know what the hell I'm babbling about?

One "Young Adult" series I never took a liking to was those VC Andrews books about the incestuous kids living in the attic.

i've been out at -30C. that was freaking cold. nose hairs froze up

i dont cope well with cold, my circulation is bad and theres not enough fat on me to keep me warm. argh, i need sleep! why did i fall asleep earlier?

Oh, I think that was probably Go Ask Alice, written by Beatrice Sparks, who made a career of writing moralistic cautionary and rather formulaic novels about young people who meet tragic ends because of bad decisions they make.

Ooh I'd love to go to articartica. Don't seem to have any vacancies for s though

Only young people? That's kind of discriminatory...

Books designed to be read with one hand!! Oh Z, what a wonderful oblique description for porn.

d'E said: "I only read books that are marked "Ages 40 - 45". Well, sometimes I sneak the ones labelled "45-50" but I only read them at night, with a flashlight, so my mother won't find out. I wouldn't be caught dead with a 35-40 book - those are for thirtysomethings. "

Jeez, what books are banded for 60+?? Nabokov and Henry James? Thackeray?

My youthful reading was rather like fg's...indiscriminate. If it was on the shelf at the house, I read it. I particularly remember Clan of the Cave Bear. How dreadful that book really is, but when I was what? 11? I remember liking it.

If you thought Clan of the Cave Bear was Bad, you should NOT read the sequel. It is, like, totally dire.

Sad truth, I did already. YUCK!

My reading habit came from being punished. It was acceptable for "the corner" to be in front of the book case. I read everything in that book case, including the encyclopedia set.

I do remember reading the Cruel Sea when about 14 and That was then this is now/The outsiders at about the same time . Banding , as long as its not being used as a form of censorship , well I cant see it being such a bad thing if applied sensibly .
I enjoyed Phillip Pullmans 'His dark materials' trilogy even though it was aimed at teens .

Today the phone box says 'The big tidy up'

click for pick http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3238/2823768401_153c52e261.jpg