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

oh, yeh, the one that doesn't fit into a nice little nook. *identifies* Good use of h2g2 and the computer. nice use of humor in giving opinions (like the Millennium Dome). liked the watergun and the universe committing suicide.
hay, I've read all of your stories! please write more? pretty please?
BTW, I agree with the comment about the story being more important on the larger scale of Life than the planet it was written on, and I liked the part about the planet not minding it too much when we eradicated ourselves, ect.

I'm VERY glad you liked it!
I thought it was a nice little tale which I think I wrote mainly as vanity.
I've been spending 2 years (now it's 3 - help!) trying to write "Arcadia", an epic tale of Immortality, Morality, Killing Unkillable Devils, Perfection, Love and Humanity, and it still isn't finished. Hopefully it will be soon, and I was just looking to the time when I'd finished it, and thinking "What will happen with this? Is there any possible way it could be published, and would anyone want to read it?" when I came up with the idea for this short story.

It's definately a morale booster - and was written to try and make me feel happy about "Arcadia", but I think it works well on it's own. Hope you're not thinking "That big-headed , is that how good he thinks his writing is?!?!?!?!" I enjoy writing, and I write mainly for me, but I must admit I want to know that other people will enjoy what I write too. If I thought that no-one would ever read what I have written, I wouldn't decide to give up, but I'd probably be less likely to write as much.

Whoops! When I described "Arcadia", I didn't mention the phrase "roller-coaster of a ride". When describing stories etc, it's the law to use the phrase "rollercoaster of a ride", isn't it?

When I've finally finished "Arcadia", I've a couple more ideas for short stories, including one about genetic engineering, and one about a clone of Shakespeare.

I think you've flattered me too much, so I'll shut up before me ego gets too enormous.

<BB<

You write very well and people will enjoy it. I'm not butt, B.B.
it isn't flattery, it's the truth. Do the stories you mentioned and post them , 'cause I like reading them , (When you have the time , that is).
Hay, do you think you could read mine? It's new on the H2G2 Fiction Central. I'm not sure about it , 'cause it's more of a senario than a story, but I think it works. I write mostly horror, but I've never posted anything in public before. Y'know, when you're not too busy.

When I've finished them I'll certainly put them on H2G2, don't worry.
Thanks for reading them.

I had a read of Does It Work:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/h2g2/guide/A619913
and I thought it worked well, and was good to read. A scenario can work as a peice of fiction as well as a story if written well enough - Arthur C. Clarke's short stories were mainly scenarios, afterall.

<BB<

Thanks. I love to write, but I'm so long winded, I wind up writing 200 pages before the story's over. That's why most of my submissions will be senarios; they'll be exerps (Spelling?) of a book I've written. I'm glad to know there's still a place for them.
hay, is blue bottle a dolphin? my mind is working rather slow these days, and I've been missing some rather obvious references, lately. For some reason, I thought it referred to a lizard of some kind, because of an amphibian reference in one of the postings. Dolphins are mammals, though. God, I gotta get some sleeep!

Ironically enough (and completely by coincidence) I read "Does it Work?" and "Happily Ever After" one after the other. I liked them both quite a bit, but I haven't been able to find writing like this in too many places. Rambling, BB, who are your influences? I love this stuff...

I wrote my story from an old notebook sketch intended to develop a character into the main character in a novel. Steven King once wrote an essay in fiction writing that advised authors to develop their characters like that; make up a history for your characters, even up to the point of writing scenes from their lives that you will never use. That way you know them, and how they would react to any situation that they might find themselves in.
D.A., Monty Python, Playing d&d and seeing how game players treat their characters and each other, Tolkien, H.P. Lovecraft and Edgar Allen Poe, Asimov, movies...I'm influenced by a lot of things.

A Bluebottle is many things:
A fly,
A Portugeuse Man o' War Jelly fish,
A bottle which is blue,
A charcter played by Peter Sellers in the Goon Show,
A character played by Bernard Cribbins in "Carry On Spying".

As for what are my influences, I don't really know. When I write, I try to write in my own way and my own style, I am me afterall. But because I try not to write in the same style as anyone else, it doesn't mean they don't influence me subconsciously.

<BB<

thanks for clearing that up. My style is my own, as well. I am influenced, however, by the things I read, and hear. Unconsiously it gets into the way I think, talk, and, yes, write.I'm a firm believer that our environment has a lot to do with who we become, but the key to who we are lies in our personality--how we accept the things that happen to us, and how we feel about them. Take 2 people from the same family, with the same life's experiences, and they can turn out completely opposite of one another, or similar to one another, but they'll always have some individuality.your intellectual environment is just as important as your physical one. You don't need to imitate someone to be influenced by them.If you like what they've done, then you've made an active choice to agree with them,and you've learned in the process that your opinions and instincts are valid, which, at the very least, brings you to trust yourself.
Hope that wasn't too long-winded. It's an interesting topic.