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

O.K. then, Bonobo 'ask me anything' Vonnegut!
Here's a Q:
How long is the rifle in Happy Birthday. No cheating, mind!

I admit I don't know the exact length...but I seem to recall that it was quite long for a penis. A yard, maybe?

It's not the Vonnegut work I'd recommend for starters, but it does contain some themes and phrases which recur in subsequent novels - such as 'Go take a flying at the moon.'

Bonobo,
Nearly! 30 inches long the rifle was. But since you made the connection I'll give you the point. And a bonus point for remembering the line about the moon.

Just started on Catch-22 by Jospeh Heller. Reckon it's time to read that one again.

Slaughterhouse 5 was my first Vonnegut book. I found I couldn't put it down. I must read it again soon. Perhaps after Catch-22.

Hah! Coincidentally I was thinking of Catch-22 last night when I heard a line on TV: "It was love at first sight." ("The first time Yossarian saw the chaplain he fell madly in love with him."). .

But wouldn't life be soooo weird if there never any coincidences?

Yes, Slaughterhouse 5 has to be Vonnegut's magnum opus. A3724823

Oh...and as Vonnegut afficianados will know, the line about the moon is reprised in "Slapstick, or Lonesome No More", when it becomes:
"Go take a flying at a rolling donut. Go take a flying at the mooooon!"

("My mommy was a Moon and my daddy was a Glampers." - Diana Moon Glampers in 'God Bless You, Mr Rosewater')

Go on...anything...

I've got Catch-22 in my "to read" pile... but first I'm about to finish The Heritige of Hastur (Marion Zimmer Bradley) and Riley's Luck (Louis L'Amour)
but I've just had a present of Sharpe's Fury - so everything will have to wait...

although I have also just been given a present of the Dieux Du Stade coffee table book... more nekkid French rugby players than you can shake a stick at!

>>I've got Catch-22 in my "to read" pile.

I advise you to get it in the 'reddit' pile soon. My parents handed me theirs after they;d enjoyed it at first, but then discarded it as 'repetitive'. But I think the idiotic repetitiveness of life in wartime was the whole point. Anyway...I loved it.

Especially the bit about buying eggs for 5 cents, selling them for three cents and making two cents profit per egg.

And the chocolate-covered cotton.

And the hunt for TS Eliot.

And Nately's whore.

And Yossarian's fish dream.

And Chaplain Tapman's Deja/ Jusqu'a/ Jamais vu.

And Major Major Major Major.

And the cab apples/ horse chesnuts in the cheek.

etc.

I get the picture... but Sharpe calls me first

"idiotic repetetiveness of life in wartime was the whole point"

Right on the money Edward!

Ed,
Apropos the chocolate covered cotton scam - that's just before where I'm up to. I'm up to where Yossarian is naked in the tree. But I can't understend why Milo didn't get them to bomb Cairo docks where all the cotton was ... ah; perhaps he only found out about the glut when they started moving the stuff.
But it's a great idea to bomb yourself isn't it? It saves the other side having to do it. That way you save on flying hours, aviation fuel etc., so if both sides make a deal, as per Milo, and bomb themselves it makes economic and political sense.
Those recent pics on TV of Don Rumsfeld serving chicken in Iraq and smiling to camera could almost be from a Catch-22 scene couldn't they? And also, when I think of it now, wasn't there something in the media a couple of Thanksgivings ago - pics of George B serving a rubber or a plastic turkey to the men because Milo hadn't delivered the real ones? Something like that it was.
Lucky

>>But I can't understend why Milo didn't get them to bomb Cairo docks where all the cotton was ...

Wind that back a minute. Are you *meant* to understand? Myself, I *did* become convinced that you could buy eggs for five cents and sell them for three and clear two cents profit per egg. And that's scary!

And those eggs even hit 7 cents somewhere along the line. It's how the Milo co-operative works. It's almost like the modern EU. You send a truckload of beef from Ireland (say) all around the EU and then in/out of EU via Ukraine (say) and when it all comes back to you in Ireland (say) you get more money for it than if you just sent it to yourself in Ireland (or something like that).

Oh, we can manage such silliness without the EU. As we speak, there's probably a big pile of body armour in a warehouse near Catterick.

Not any more. They flogged it cut price to the Palestinian police. I saw them wearing it on TV.

Or it might have been sent to Irak or Iraq (however you spell it these days). Near Babylon anyway.

Having watched The Hogfather on telly at the weekend, I thought I'd better read the original!

Can anyone recommend good books to read over xmas, tv is rubbish and no exciting parties.

I'd recommend Michael Baigent's new book The Jesus Papers, subtitled Exposing the Greatest Cover-up in History, as being completely unsuitable for Christmas. Rush out therefore and buy it. You should with a bit of luck find it in the History/Controversial Knowledge Section of your local bookshop.

good long books are great for christmas, you know the ones you would neve normally have time to read?

im reading lady chatteleys lover by d h laurance this christmas.

well im cheating ivebeen reading it for about 4 christmas'!!!!

I can recommend anything by Janet Evanovitch and Jasper Fforde and Christina Jones

How are you getting on with Lady C? I found it really boring, the TV series was much better