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

*comes in to wave good-bye to Eats. Looks faintly stricken. After a pause, heads over to the kitchen for chocolate custard doughnuts and a caffelatte. Note bags under eyes and general air of sagging. Not nearly as bad as S's, but between us we could probably pack for a month in the Arctic*

I have a cold and I ache from the neck up.

On a lighter note I woke up early this morning (sometime around dawn) to hear Iron Maiden (Number of the Beast) on the radio... that's not such a big thing I know but our radio is tuned to Radio 2!

Radio 2 is fast becoming The Home of Decent Music. With any luck Radio 1 will vanish forever within a couple of years.

Since Peel's passing Radio 1 has lost all it's redeeming features.

*sends kind thoughts Eats' way*

Off to Italy later today - back on Thursday. And while I'd love to get some Brunello and proper Italian cheese sent virtually through the wires to the Atelier, I do reckon that online time may be scarce. Which, OTOH, will leave me in peace from w**k E-mails

*waves*

Yarrr, Oi've got a braand new frigate!

Teuchter - yes I did mean Falco. Top quality. I think my point was that there's nothing wrong with historical novels using modern phrases. The difference between this and the book you were complaining about is probably that Lindsey Davis knows she's being modern and often does it homourously.

Mol - I don't think I've heard the pirate sketch, but did you know Old Harry's Game is on Radio 4 at half-six tonight? Sadly they've only given him four episodes this time round.

G'bye Eats. Pop in if you get the time, won't you?

I haven't listened to Radio 1 in years. R2 is on all day at work, but I'd choose to listen to it anyway. I'm a bit worried that it's going the way of R1, though - you tend to get some records played far too often and not enough time given to little-heard records.

Old Harry's Game! Old Harry's Game! *does happy dance*

'Do you haff any idea how COLD it vas in that sodding musem library? Huh?'

'By rights you should be in the fiery pit with all the other murderers, fornicators and blackmailers.'
'But I've never done any of those things!'
'You've done all of them in the same weekend.'
'Well you can't count party conferences.'

(apologies for all inaccuracies)

Take care Eats!~waves~

I've only read onr book by Pratchett (don't remember which one) but didn't like it, so haven't tried any of his other books. It seemed too much like the kind of TV series where, if you miss one episode, you're hopelessly left behind, losing the plot, and reading the book was like watching one episode half way through the series.

I was sitting in the main room of the flat, wondering whether now was a good time to put the kettle on, when I heard a bizarre squeaking noise. It came at about five-second intervals, and sounded almost exactly like a toy squeaky rubber duck. It was coming from the sink. Slowly I approached the sink; was it mice? Was it aliens? Was it Franky and Benjy? There was nothing in the sink apart from the usual pile of breakfast bowls and plates and a lemon squeezer (huh? When did I squeeze a lemon today?). No living beings. But still, squeak....squeak.....squeak.... And then I realised the tap was dripping, and as each drop of water fell into the bowl, it squeaked. I am supposing the wet bowl was leaning on the wet glass lemon squeezer at exactly the right angle and pressure, and each drop 'vibrated' the water in the bowl, and hence the bowl too, which rubbed minutely against the lemon squeezer, which caused the squeak, much like running a wet finger around the rim of a wine-glass.

And that will probably be the most exiting thing that happens to me all day.

Oh, yeah, and another 'no thanks' reply to a job application. It seems the gods are FORCING me to be a writer because no one wants me for anything else at all.

What was I doing? Oh, yes, kettle on. Tea.

The loss of plot feeling isn't a problem with most Pratchett books as even with the Rincewind books you only need the slightest amount of backstory to understand the plot (the major exeptions to this are Interesting Times and The Last Continent, you need to read IT first otherwise Rincewind's presence on EcksEcksEcksEcks makes no sense whatsoever). The only books which intentionally have a full-blown story arc are the Colour of Magic and the Light Fantastic, everything else is pretty much a stand-alone story with a few recurring characters.

Eats, I wish you fair seas and following winds.

But 17thC English is perfectly intelligible to the modern year, Bagpuss, and Imperial Latin by and large isn't.

Of course you can go too far the other way. The victorians and writers in the early 20thC had a bad addiction to "Gadzookery", including too many supposedly period phrases such as "Zounds!" and so on.

The most enjoyable example of effective use of English so that it gives a period flavour that I have ever come across is Erica Jong's "Fanny".

Um. I could have phrased that SO much better...

B

Modern ear. With an E.

B

Mm, definitely open to mis-interpretation there, Ben.

(Waves fond goodbye to Eats )

The best music radio station I know is the digital channel BBC Radio 6Music. I got my digibox mainly so that I could listen to it through the TV. For old fans of Peel-type music it's perfect; you get lots of good oldies of the indie/alternative kind, but they also play plenty of great new stuff. You can get The Clash followed by KT Tunstall followed by The Beatles followed by Arcade Fire. Looking at their web page ( http://www.bbc.co.uk/6music/ ) I see that today they're highlighting Jimi Hendrix and the new album by one of my favourite current bands, Broadcast, which is a good illustration of the station's range. All that and they have one of my Seventies heroes, Tom Robinson, as a regular DJ!

Morning all.

Does the fact that modern life is so noisy bother anyone except me? I think that's why I love snow so much. Because the whiter things get, the quieter they get as well. Traffic noises go away, often the eletricity goes off, so there aren't any whirrings and buzzings and hummings.

Right now I am listening to the clothes dryer, the dish washer, the air conditioner and an airplane going over the house.

Another reason I'm looking forward to snow is because I'm sick of hot weather. Yesterday the temperature at the bank said 98ºF. Granted, that particular thermometer is usually wrong, but it still was 94º.

I have a board meeting tonight. So I have to get all of the checks cut this morning. And my printer isn't at all a happy machine.

I am often longing for complete silence too Hyp - but I never seem to come across it...

Not in my flat (refrigerator, ventilation (can't shut it off), noises from my neighbours, like taps running that need a change of gasket by the sound of it, kids playing loud games, door slammed shut. It's not even quiet in the middle of the night.

Certainly not outdoors - I wish I lived in the middle of nowhere, nearby or in a forest big enough to walk so deep into that I wouldn't be able to hear the traffic noise from highways.

One thing that struck me when I visited Kiruna (far north in Sweden, near Jukkasjärvi and the Icehotel) in the winter some years ago was the immense silence even outdoors that'd meet you as soon as you got some distance away from the city itself.

I have found silent spaces in Sweden, Titania, but I really felt it in the Australian Desert.

We are a noisy species.

B