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

Walter My Old Cobber
I am still in computer limbo ... I had it back for the weekend but it is still playing up so has to go back today. One of the problems is that due to the need to reload Windows, I have lost all my email addresses and messages. Could you be so kind as to send me an email (the normal kind under our other aliases) so that I can get your address again.
Better finish this message before the computer jams again.
Toodle-pip
Bran

Gooday Bran cobber,

Have you been missed or what!? Get back on here and brighten my days. Am emailing you under separate brown paper-wrapped cover.

Walter.

Walter Lad!

Well ... back again for the weekend and the computer is running very smoothly at the moment, albeit without any sound (not sure why???). I didn't receive a corroborative email from you, but that was probably due to things being lost left, right and centre over here. BUT, I have managed to get all my email addresses back: rescued from computer oblivion. So, I am able to be in contact again all going well.

I see that you have become a very active member of this community ... much more chatty than I have been lately. Well done.

Best dash and continue to reload software, relocate data, etc.

All the best
Bran.

Gooday Bran, cobber,

What a relief to have you back. I will look forward to hearing from you in our more conventional channels. Take care,

Walter.

Hiya Waltmeister (notice change of idiom)

I have just done a promo for you on my page and added a link from my page to yours. This is one of the things I learned to do fairly recently. If you want to put a link in to my page in your intro (that is if I'm not being presumptuous), click on "edit page" and insert something like this:

For early medieval history have a look at Bran the Explorer

If you want to link to a specific page, for whatever reason, here is an example:

Taipan is the author of the newly-approved entry: Important Events in the History of Scotland


Makes moving about to favourite pages on the guide a bit quicker.

Take care
Bran.

Gooday Bran,

You have been busy! The crit is very sweet but, I fear, excessive. As you well know, my history interests are narrowly cast; I'm one of those people who has got to know more and more about less and less until reaching the stage of knowing practically nothin about virtually everything. And I don't even really like the Tudors! But I will make every effort to come and hear your lecture in a couple of weeks' time and for the benefit of the many who will not be so fortunate, I think you should post it on the web. Take care,

Walter.

Gooday Bran,

I thought it politic to post this particular thought to a forum far away from 'table for nine'. How could you?!! How could you actually congratulate someone for including Mary Queen of Scots as one of the invitees to the most sought after dinner since the Last Supper? Leaving aside the misguided romantic notions and fantasies engendered and perpetuated by addle-pated Scots over-endowed with nostalgia for a lost era that in fact never existed, or myths developed by fiction writers pandering to a besotted Victorian readership, what did this treacherous, adulterous slag ever do that was deserving of a niche in history and a seat at our table? Apart from giving Elizabeth 1001 reasons to kill her and Britain James I. Never was it said more truly that the manner of her leaving her life was a vast improvement upon her living of it.

So how are you, cobber?

Walter.

Well ... not that this is a sore point for you!

I must confess that I made my criteria very ideosyncratic in my main list - they all had to be literate (or probably so), and medieval, preferably early medieval, and the common issue with the monarchs is that they sponsored literacy or at least had a decent hand in getting books written, copied and collected etc. Bede and Gildas were also chosen as I'm sure that they would have a thing or two to say to each other.

The call for Mary was for pure interest in the story that she might tell. A slag, eh? Don't let our Scot prof friend here you say that. Surely a duplicitous strumpet might be interesting dinner party conversation? But, I'd agree, don't include her for her "historical" merit (whatever that means).

I am well Old Mate, and I hope you are as well. And getting more sleep!

Cheerio
Bran the World-Renowned Early Medieval Scholar

And on further thought ... what are you doing on the Guide all the time when you have all those essays to write??? Is this getting them done?? I don't think so. I don't want to see anything less than a 90% now!

(Hope they are all going well)
Cheers
Bran.

Bran,

I wish. 7500 words to do by mid October and no direction, no inspiration and no enthusiasm. H2g2 has very little to do with it. Or work (did you see our case on TV last night), or anything else. I think this year has just been to big and too full and there hasn't been enough time and fuel and stuff for uni work. My essay writing tolerance threshold has been irreparably breached. My reserves of energy and commitment are rooted. I have to give a presentation on Monday, twenty minutes or so, on The Elizabethan 'Golden Age' - All that Glisters [sic] is not Gold. Can't blame anyone, I made up the topic. Have not written one single word. Same with Classics and Res Gestae; wrote up the notes, or most of them, about two months ago and haven't as much as brought up the file on screen since. It's due the week after next. I'm not complaining, even if it sounds like it. Glad you asked? Haveagoodweekend cobber, say hello to Liane.

Walter.

Ahh Walter ... I know how you feel. You have been going full-slog at this study business for quite a few years, so it is not surprising that you are having a bit of a malaise. You have written so many essays that I am surprised you haven't had an essay writing block earlier. That you have lasted till now is a testament to your dedication and capacity for originality.

I go up and down with mine. I have been two and a half years on the same topic (!) ... and though I really enjoy it, there are times when I just wished it was over as it feels like an albatross around my neck. I have bursts of enthusiasm, followed by whatever the opposite of such a burst is. But, I have an end date in sight and that has helped. If there is anything I can do to help (barracking Elizabeth papers, etc), please let me know.

No didn't see your case on the news (as far as I remember). What was it about?

Do have a great weekend ... and don't forget the 1500 metre final in the pool!!!!! Hi to Sue.

Cheerio and best wishes my friend.
Bran.

Gooday Bran,

Thanks for the encouragement cobber. Sue is up to her neck with her final essay, so she is working on our home computer and I'm in at the legionnaire's disease repository to get cracking on mine. Enjoy your trip to the Peninsular; talk with you soon.

Walter

Hiya Walter

How did your paper on Elizabeth go? Was it yesterday? I hope that you had a fruitful weekend.

Are you suffering Olypics fatigue yet? We are a bit ... of course watched the big events last night, but the commercial channel coverage and the emphasis on GOLD and on Australian participants has begun to wear somewhat. Still, what a show! Even my parents think that Sydney has done an excellent job!

Well ... back to Northumbria.
Cheers
Bran.

Gooday Bran,

Thanks, the presentation went okay, I think. Can't call it a paper because I didn't write anything.

Olympics still retains its magic most of the time, but an completely turned off by the Freeman hype which in my view has got seriously out of hand. Last night's viewing, or that part I didn't sleep through, was a bit dull - weightlifting, water polo and diving. Roy and HG are generally the highlight of each evening but my endurance levels being what they are I either don't make it to the starting blocks or fall asleep during the first commercial!

Catch you soon. Take care cobber,

Clive.

Hi Walter
Can't find your God posts, that you refered to in your email. Where did you say they were?
Have a good weekend my friend.
Bran.

P.S. Call off the search. I think I just found it.
Bye
Bran.

He moves in mysterious ways His wonders to perform.

Ain't that the truth.

Hello Walter

I have just read the poem on your page! WOW! It really says it all ... that is why we are doing this! Please pass on my compliments to your friend (who I assume is the Moondancer mentioned?) From one historian to another, I am overwhelmed.

Cheerio
Bran.

Hi Bran,

You are too easily distracted, cobber, by things that do not directly relate to your thesis (ditto me in relation to a pair of unfinished and very late essays).

Yes, it was Moondancer who wrote the poem. She has done others, which are on her page, and has a prodigious talent for poetry, some of which is awesomely haunting. Moondancer is also very interested in history, and is an all round nice person, so pay her a visit and make yourself known. I doubt if she likes Vikings, though. Take care,

Walter.