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

This could get tedious. For example:-
'This morning I put on my anorak (a bright pink jacket, supposed to be waterproof) and joined my husband on a walk to our local nature reserve. We went looking at the sloe bushes. (Sloes, also called blackthorn, are very common in England. They are spiky, have white flowers in spring and small purple fruit like little plums in the autumn.) We were hoping to find brown hairstreak butterfly eggs. (Now that takes a lot of explaining.) https://www.wildlifetrusts.org/wildlife-explorer/invertebrates/butterflies/brown-hairstreak

Oh, yeah! Making it not tedious is the art part. It takes being sneaky, indirect, clever, roundabout, exemplary... It's where a lot of the work comes in.

But oh boy, is it worth it. I've taken a shot at yours, even though I've never seen any of this.

This morning I put on my pink, allegedly-waterproof anorak and joined my husband on a walk to our local nature reserve. We went looking at the sloe bushes - so we were keeping a sharp eye out for the common spiky plants. We'd seen lots of the white flowers in spring, and now we were looking for the small, purple fruits - like little plums - that are part of an English autumn.

While we were out, we also wanted to look for brown hairstreak butterfly eggs. Hairstreaks are elusive, but they lay their eggs in blackthorn hedges.

Hedge cultures in England shelter such a variety of wildlife that it's really rewarding to go exploring - good exercise, too. Just hope that your anorak is really waterproof.

That's very good advice, Dmitri. It's hard to anticipate the snags that might come up, though.

Your mention of the different meanings of "block" is very apropos. I had no idea what "block" meant in the U.K. "New kids on the Block" might carry different connotations on the other side of the Atlantic.

Good point! See Sasha's comment on this column. One of the reasons we have Peer Review is so that commenters from different cultures can make notes on what's not clear. We can't expect to know all these things ourselves.

We don't have Peers in my country, so I appreciate letting the U.K.'s Peers review guide entries.

(I'm kidding, of course)