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

Sorry for the prolonged silence, my PC pheonixed about five days ago and I'm just today coming back online. I hate Microsoft. I really, really hate Microsoft. About every six months or so my PC just decides to commit suicide and deletes the config.sys files. Happens faster if I'm online a lot downloading stuff, but it happens anyway even without a connection.

Anyway, that's all a seguey into the fact that I've lost all my contacts for my IM client manager and you'll be seeing another request from me pretty soon.

Hi ya! Well glad to know you are up and running again .
Flame

Hello matey! Haven't seen you around too much lately, hope you have all your PC problems sorted. So what's happening with you?

I've had one of those days! Well for a start my broadband went down Thursday evening and it still wasn't back on Friday morning. Grrrrr! Then to top it all, about 15 people were milling about the office today and drove me to distraction. I'm so glad it's Friday because next week will also be busy at work.

I've started thinking about my end of story entry again. I've noticed some people are already posting their entries on the Get Writing site. Read a few for Dryad, which is also my entry. This evening I discovered an end of story guide page. Pity I didn't see it before I wrote my story, but such is life. I'd like you to take a look at my ending. Will ya, pretty please?

I've written a new story in the last couple of days but I'm not happy with it. It lacks something but not sure what it is. Back to the drawing board maybe. I have so many ideas floating around in my head I sometimes don't know which ones to go with.

I think I'm going to take a creative writing course at the local college in September. Might be fun to mix with other would be writers. Did one of these a few years ago, it was c***p, the best thing about it was the drink in the pub after, but hopefully this one will be better. If it isn't, hopefully the pub will be good.

Flame

I think I've got my PC probs fixed. We'll see in time, though I guarentee it'll crash again this year. Sorry I haven't been online much lately, but I've been busy trying to pay bills and running a thousand errands. Went to see my PO on the first, all's well there. I like this guy, he seems to only want to make sure I'm being good, which I am, and that's it. I found a good job at a seafood buffet place, the tips aren't really that good, but the turnover guarentees decent money at the end of the night. It being a holiday weekend here (independace day) so that's in my favor although the fourth will be slow due to the fireworks displays. That's about it for what's going on here.

I'd be happy to read over 'Dryad', only I'm not too sure where it's at. I guess I'll have a look over in Get Writing and hopefully find yours. You are still flameofgold over there aren't you? BTW, congrats about 'Joshua'! You'll see the front page again!

Good luck with the creative writing course, but you don't need it. You have whatever it is that's needed to write really well. At the very least it's a good excuse to go to the pub for a draft or five.

Anyway, I've got to download the Yahoo IM again so we can chat. I'll see you then.

Happy July 4th. Of course it's Independance Day this weekend. How could I forget? Hope you have a good one. Sounds like you have found a much better environment to work, and glad to hear things are going well for you. Not that I didn't think they would.......
Thanks! I will mail my story over to you as it isn't posted anywhere on the site. There are approximately 2,000 entries per story, so I'm not holding my breath to make it as a finalist. Even so, I expect all 17,000 of us are hoping to get that phone call sometime this month to say we have. That's a lot of competition, so I will not be too disappointed if it doesn't happen.
Joshua on the front page? That's the first I've heard about it. Nobody has told me. Still, that's great news, and obviously I'm very pleased. Flame

Hello matey. How are you? I'm feeling happy, I'm on holiday this week. Not going far, just need a break from the rat race. Decided I would never get this decorating finished which I started weeks ago unless I took some time off work. Just don't seem to have the time at the weekends for it, too many other things to do. Having said that, I didn't do any decorating today but I expect tomorrow I will have the old paint brush out. However hard I try not to, I always end up painting myself. Also have a few things to do on the garden......

So how are things with you? I wrote a small story for the BBC Kent competition the other day, one which they run monthly. Only 750 words to complete it, so I thought it was a quite a tight target. I think you can send as many entries as you like, but just the one was enough for me. Nothing special, but it didn't turn out too bad. Working on something else now.
Flame

I'm ok, for the most part. I've got the next two days off, which is good, I need the rest. My job has been going so well that I think I'll finally be out of the hole I dug when I moved. At least all my bills will be paid and my truck will finally be legal. I've been putting the truck off for entirely too long, while driving it everywhere I need to go.

I've started playing my guitar again. Not too sure if I've managed to progress any, but the peice I'm currently working on is a little more intricate than others I've attempted. Sometimes I just have to take a break from playing. It seems that if I play every day, day in and day out, that I stagnate, but if I just put the thing down for a week or two something new and interesting just comes out of it's own accord. Another interesting benifit from taking a break is that techniques that were giving me problems before just play out naturally, as if I spent that time practicing rather than goofing off.

Hope you enjoy your holiday, so don't work too hard around the house. I'm spending tonight cleaning my apartment so I don't have to on my actuall days off. That and I have too much to do tomorrow to get anything done. I'm going to check out the local flea market to see how things are run and what I'm going to have to do to sell my products.

Hi ya! Glad to hear you are getting yourself sorted and that life is looking much brighter for you. That is just great news!

I've been painting today, more on me than the woodwork! Ran out of undercoat as well, grrrrr! So off to the DIY centre in the morning.

I'm forever trying to write something different. My latest attempt is A2837513. I know you are not so keen on happy endings, this doesn't have one, no twist, just a story. Any comments would be appreciated.
Flame

Disturbing portrayal of the depths to which people can sink over useless ideologies. I liked it. The title reminded me of a song lyric, 'out of the darkness, into the light, sparks fly from the weary sights of my, double barrel, 12 guage, can't lock me in your cage!', Pantera, Cowboys From Hell. The story fits the lyrics quite well.

I wonder, are there really tribes by those names in Africa? Idle curiosity, but I still wonder.

running late for work.

Hi ya! There really are tribes in Rwanda called Tutsi and Hutu. There really was genocide there in 1994. I remember the terrible images on the TV, as if they were yesterday. Almost a million people died in the conflict, mainly tortured - having limbs cut off and then hacked to death. Women being forced to kill their own children and rape on a wide scale, mostly by aids infected males. The real story is much uglier than I could write or even imagine. It's 10 years ago but many people there are still suffering. That's what brought their plight to mind. Having said that, I'm going to go back to it and rewrite it in the first person, see what happens with the story then.

My holiday week is going much too fast. Going out and about tomorrow, on the north norfolk coast, its beautiful there, just have a wander around. I'm off to Hastings next weekend to visit a friend. Not a part of the country I have been before, so looking forward to that as well.
Flame

Ahh, now I understand the lack of a happy ending. When depicting real life there can hardly be a happy ending. Which is the primary reason I dislike them so much. When all ends so swell for everybody the suspension of disbelief is ruined for me. When all ends fubar I tend to sympathize with the protaganists more, for that's what I see most often in my own life. It's a case of me feeling better when the imaginary charicters have it worse off than I do.

I guess that outlook will change when my life is truely better for my efforts. My first order arrived yesterday, and I've priced them all for the flea market. I've also set up a basic accounting system (pen and paper) that will allow me to keep track of what the buisiness is doing. Hopefully that little bit of effort will be helpful when I actually do hire an accountant, or when I need to incorperate the buisiness into an LLC. I'm not really sure why I'm doing it (flea markets aren't taxable, and don't require a buisiness licence) but my nature forces me to keep track of it all.

Have fun in your wanderings. I've often found that taking a stroll through some nature helps to clear my head. Not that I really get that much of a chance to, but it does help when I can. Remember, this is your holiday, which means no real work should get done. I always take one day a week to do absolutely nothing. Works wonders on my stress levels.

Hello matey. How are you? Thank goodness it's Friday. I'm drinking a nice glass of wine and doing a few things around the house. Off to Hastings in the morning and will be back sometime Sunday. It's about a 4 hour drive so will probably be knackered when I get back. I know I will not feel like doing much Sunday evening and have an early start Monday morning. Team meeting, how I wish somebody else would do the minutes! Somehow, it's always little old me!
So what's new with you?
Flame

Once again my PC crashed. I'm getting pretty good at fixing it, down to about three hours for the initial fix when I finally find the time. Then only about five hours of installation for various programs that I like to run. I did discover the reason for it, Norton System Works 2004. It competes with the native programs in Windows XP for some of the simalar functions and will eventually wipe out the config.sys files to ensure it's dominance. I'm reverting to Norton 2003 in order to avoid the problem.

Other than that not much is new. I'm doing pretty good at the flea market. After three days (a weekend and a half) I'm still showing a profit, though not much. At the very least I'm getting all the guesswork done early so when I open my retail store I'll have a really good idea of what will actually sell to these people. Unfortunately all the prep work that I have to do for my buisiness means I have less time online. Of course in a month or so I think I'll be going back to working in a hotel for the duration of the off-season, which will mean more time online, if at an indecent hour.

A2197578

Hi! Thanks, you did a great job with the fairy tale entries, very nice write up.

So how's you? I've had a busy week, what with work, gardening, plus I've written a new short story. Glad it's almost the weekend......
Flame

My life's pretty much the same week after week.

I think I'm hitting that ole' wall once again in my guitar work. May have to take a break for a week or two to see how it goes.

I've become active in playing DCI sanctioned type 1 tournaments for Magic: The Gathering (magic for short). It's a geek game, but I need the practice if I ever plan to go pro and make the big bucks. Sat. night I'll play in my first type 2 tourney, hopefully I'll do better since the card selection is pretty limited for type 2 (which is they type played professionally). I just can't really compete against the type 1 players as I don't really have the 'power 9' cards that really wreck havok. 'Power 9' is the title given to the nine best cards in the game, and with all nine a person is neigh on unbeatable. Oh well...

I read your latest story. Kind of depressing, but well written. Lots of angst and self-recrimination in it. I liked it. At first I thought it was a farewell to hootoo, but I was glad to be proven wrong. By the way, why did you remove it from the AWW?

Hope you do well at your card game. Maybe you will let me know how you got on.

I removed the story from AWW because I needed to make a few changes to it. Thanks to a few suggestions from JWF I've added a new bit in and changed it around a little. Hopefully it reads much better and I'll be able to put it back for review. Just waiting to hear what he thinks of it now.......

Sorry you found it a little depressing. Guess I got carried away with writing in a different gender and trying to make it reflect real life. Anyway, I thought you didn't like stories with happy endings.

Flame

You're right, I don't like happy endings. I did like your story, mainly because it was depressing. If a story can make me feel something, anything, then it was a good story. There were a few parts that I could tell it was written by a woman, but that may have been because I know you.

I didn't get to play in the tournament like I had planned. A friend's car broke down and I had to help him get to it to fix it. It was about an hour away and took about two hours to fix. Not long all in all, but just long enough to make me miss the tournament. There's always next week. It's not really that important that I attend the tournaments right now as I'm not good enough to make the pro tour for next year, so I have another year to hone my skills (and my deck designs) before I try to make the pros. That's the same year that I'm going to use to make my buisiness successfull enough to run without me for short periods of time while I attend the pro tourneys.

Ambitious barely begins to describe me.

With all the little schemes you have in the frame I'll soon need to call you Mr Money Bags. Good luck!

Written by a female? Is this the guy who used to think I was a man, lol. Sorry, I'm never going to let you live that down am I. You are probably right, it might come across in a rather feminine style. Any bits in particular? Please don't say all of it, ha! Would be happy for any suggestions you might have for giving a more 'male' feel to it. Despite the difficulties I'm having with this story I'm reluctant to delete it - yet!

Flame

Well, I plan to be Mr. Moneybags one of these days, just not today apparently. One small step at a time, and I'll take over the world (mwhaaa haaa haaaaaa!). Ok, maybe not, but a few billion would be a great concellation prize.

Well...It's not really any turn of phrase that made me think a woman wrote 'The Last Visit', it was more of a word here and there. For instance a man doesn't 'traips' anywhere. At least not if they're straight. There were a few other words that just seemed too sensual to have come from a guy, but what do I know? I come from a male facist part of the world that has no room in it for anything soft or weak in what a guy says or does.

At least get another opinion before you delete it, it's really very good.