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

Jazz was delighted to take Hypatia into the museum to admire the old masters - something cultural seeping into their lives again after all the strange happenings of late.

Hypatia was content.

They were not disturbed by the girl with the pineapple and other miscellaneous fruits on her head, singing in the street outside.
'I..I..I love you very much' didn't really fit in with the majestic spleandour of this artistic environment, and it was a change to have the dog find somewhere else to pee, leaving folk's shoes to dry out.

At least the seal had lost that old dry-scale fishy smell in the canals, But where was Ben? We still haven't found her. Would this search never end?

Trout Montague swam hardily through the canals of Amsterdam, admiring the merchandise on sale in the shop windows ... for a second, he thought he saw Ben sitting in one, pouting seductively ...; he was glad to be in Europe's nether-regions. Or more accurately, he was glad to be out of France, which after the thrills and spills of England had really taken the b out of banal. In fact it had taken the b out of bf***in' awful. Yes, Holland's dykes were welcome relief after gay Paris, even if the individual success of their international footballers was measured in contraceptive devices.

In view of current interest in idiomatic English phrases referring to the Dutch, the Spellchecker respectfully offers this excerpt from Fritz Spiegl’s book “The Joy of Words”, Elm Tree Press, 1986.

....That delightful little treasure-trove programme Enquire Within recently had a question from a listener about the meaning of ‘My Old Dutch’, as in the famous music-hall song. The producers duly looked it up in Partridge’s Dictionary of Slang and gave a summary of his researches: ‘A wife: from c.1885; mostly cockney and esp. costermongers’, prob. coined by Albert Chevalier, who explained it by the resemblence of “the wife’s” face to that of an old Dutch clock.’ Partridge adds, ‘I used...to consider it an abbr. of duchess, but Chevalier, I now feel tolerably certain, is right.’ Well, I think Partridge swallowed one of Chevalier’s jokes. Again my discovery sprang from idle, useless reading, and powers of correlation that get you no degree in anything. In the German edition of the letters of Orlande de Lassus (1532-1594), which are entertainingly macaronic, written in old French, Latin, Italian and German (and every bit as earthy as Mozart’s, Peter Shaffer please note), the composer engages in some banter with his princely patron, ending (I translate colloquially): ‘Must stop now ‘cos I’m going to pay a visit to my wife in the Low Countries.’ To which the original German editor added a solemnly learned footnote to the effect that ‘there is no evidence that Lassus ever visited the Low Countries.’ Oh yes there is - in the shape of at least two sons who also became composers. For if you turn to a French-English glossary of colloquial phrases you will find a quite unequivocal definition of les pays-bas, which indeed Partridge himself gives, rather more politely, later in his book: ‘The Low Countries: the female pudend.’.....

The Hypatia was nursing a book, borrowed and long-overdue from her own library ... it was indeed Fritz Spiegl's "The Joy of Words", Elm Tree Press, 1986, and had fallen open ...


'Glossary of Suggested English Improvements':
_____________________________________
PUNDENDUM : n. (vulg.) Funny fanny
_____________________________________

***

What a terribly learned way to turn the conversation around to crumpet, thought jazz, in his down to earth Civil Engineering fashion. The pavior on his current job needed no such introductory technique. Minge was minge to him.

I wonder if "The joy of words", tells us why the pudendum should be referred to as crumpet, mused jazz - or is it the body bearing the said organ that is crumpet? There was plenty of that about in the windows down that street over there. But surely not Ben?

Must re-direct Hypatia's attention back to the pictures in the museum- or were we straying into the world of music with that? No that was pictures in an exhibition wasn't it?

Like Alice he felt things were getting curiouser and curiouser.

Red Windmills, Red Light Districts, Red Pills, Blue Pills.

Ben has indeed gone north, further north than anyone thought, and is sitting in the dark somewhere below the Arctic Circle playing the hand she has just been dealt and dealing with the cards which are suddenly in play.

The pill she thought was a blue pill turns out to have been a red one after all. There were only ever blue pills but she hadn't actually known that. She has been protected from the challenge which would have bitten her and quite probably defeated her, and for that she is painfully grateful. Truly, not everyone in the game is cute.

'So this is where it ends', she thinks. 'Except it doesn't of course. It twists and changes under our hands, and becomes something else. But this is where what we had ends. It is best and sweetest when it ends too soon, but that doesn't make it easy.' Not easy at all.

It had been a bitch of a year, containing much happiness, much joy, much delight, many puns, much fun in the fanny and much well fanned fun. A year when the gods weren't looking; a year when some time could be stolen and woven into something splendid for a scarlet woman to enjoy with her lover.

But you cannot steal from the gods and expect to pay no price, and now the gods are limping up to extract payment. The Norse gods first because they are nearest, Uppsala is only a few kilometers away after all. Odin, Thor, and Freya are the first. Loki of course had seen their theft. Hell, Loki had handed them the opportunity and said - 'here, take this: you'll enjoy it, it will be fun,' while Aphrodite stretched and laughed lazily, lusciously, deep down and dirtily from their rumpled bed. And enjoy it they did, and fun it most certainly was. But now the other gods are on their way: Hera and Juno, outraged and uxorial; animal-headed Egyptian gods; multi-armed demon-faced gods from Asia.

By the time the pantheon's pantechnechon arrives at the farm-house Ben and her lover will have left, and the gods will wander around in the dark, bumping into each other and blaming each other for everything. But the hole in the world that Loki gave them to slip through and play with has gone, and Ben and her lover must go their separate ways. And so they do: to Heathrow at first and then on in different directions. He sits on a plane and flies, tears falling silently down his cheeks, into the summer; while she drives dry-eyed back to the winter.

Red Pill? Blue Pill? Who are we kidding?

All pills are the same in the dark.

Looks like time to call back the Mother of God who seemed to have dropped completely out of the equation.

She would perhaps be able to put the others in their place.

Perhaps she was still sitting eating fried chicken in that magic circle on the beach? If we all call out together she may banish the gods back into the books in Hypatia's library and stack them neatly up on the shelves again.

Mog ! Mog!

The dog pricked up his ears for a moment. Was that the scent of good times returning? No. He settled back down and rested his chin on his paws. It was only a dream or was it a memory? Pehaps he should sleep. Perhaps the world would be a better place tomorow.

Hypatia tried not to think about the consequences of gods running amok. She wasn't surprised at MoG's abandoment of the company. Gods were, after all, masters at abandoning humans to their fates. But on the whole, that was preferrable to attracting their interest.

She wondered what was to happen to their small party of travellers. It appeared that their quest was to be in vain. Perhaps there would be other adventures, other opportunities for comradship. Or perhaps they would all go their separate ways.

Pinniped.....'I threw my heart to the winds and followed you. One day the wind brought me your scent, my heart swelled in gratitude and scatttered in the wind.'

Jazzme......'God only knows what this joy, this laughter bubbling inside my heart, could be! Maybe the playful wind is scattering the rose petals of my heart.'

boots......'Don't let your tears for the dying sun block your vision of the stars.'

Blacksheep.....'Sleep my friend, but if you do the light of Truth will slip by you unnoticed. Asleep in the darkness of the night you will miss the splendor of the dawn.'

Waz.....'Tell the morning breeze that you have seen my firey heart. Tell her that my heart's passion has burned all the thorns on my path.'

Trout......'In love, ask for madness, a life abandoned and a mind lost, ask for dangerous adventures in deserts filled with blood and fire.'

Ben..... beautiful Ben.....'One needs to be strong to bear the burning pain of longing; rushing toward Union is not the answer. It is in the state of separation that all ones strength is needed.'

As for Hypatia......'Troubled by questions all my life, like a madman I have been knocking at the door. It opened! I had been knocking from inside.'

Ah Hypatia,

Myself when young did eagerly frequent
Doctor and Saint, and heard great argument
About it and about:but evermore
Came out by the same door as in I went.

There was a door to which I found no key:
There was a veil past which I could not see:
Some little talk awhile of me and thee
There seemed - and then no more of thee and me

Now my

Come, fill the cup, and in the fire of spring
The winter garment of repentance fling:
The bird of time has but a little way
To fly - and lo! the bird is on the wing.

Where the heart is given it is not lost, gratefully received and returned ten-fold. Enjoy the bubbles like fine champagne whilst the rose petals last.

Look to the rose that blows about us - Lo!
'Laughing', she says, 'Into the world I blow...'
...and anon
Like snow upon the desert,s dusty face
Lighting a little hour or two - is gone.

Jazz

"Now that," thought a vexed Trout Montague, zestily ejaculating a palateful of bile, "is quintessentially the trouble with smoking too much ganja." He would have ruminated further on the Jazzme's quixotic regurgitation of the work of Omar Khayyám but was content instead to devote his thoughts to the imminent departure to an isolated farmstead in Uppsalla. "Pack my box with five dozen liquor jugs," Trout Montague instructed. And with that, a quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog.

Hypatia looks at Jazzme questioningly. Have you ever been to Uppsalla? Is it someplace we would enjoy, do you think? Are there any really good restaurants? And if we all go, will I have to put up with wet shoes all the time again?

She was enjoying strolling through the galleries of Amsterdam with Jazz, but missed the French food. A baugette spread with some brie and a bottle of wine would hit the spot.

She expected the Trout to take off for Valhalla - not Uppsalla.

She takes Jazzme's arm. "One day your paintings could be dispalyed in a great museum. You have to keep painting in order to be a painter you know."

She tries to think of the perfect spot to build Jazz a studio.

Paris? No. Too predictable.

London? Couldn't afford the building site.

How about the Cotswolds? She was rather fond of the Cotswolds. But the weather was dreadful much of the time.

One of the Greek Isles perhaps. She could plant olives and grapes and a large vegetable garden and tend them while Jazz painted.

She turned to Jazz. "Where would you like to paint? Would you consider the Ozarks? The hills aren't very high but the hollows sure are deep. It's because the land there is so ancient. The Ozarks were old and worn down before the Rockies were even born. Ancient land is appealing to me right now."

Trout Montague, Waz the Lammergeier, the Hypatia, the Jazzme, Boots the Hound, Jodan the Sheep, Orchid, Pinniped and a pickled Lettuce reconnoitered the lowly Uppsalla farmstead before them.

Orchid was sporting a black fin-band for the late "Free Willy". Trout Montague and the Jazzme mocked her conspiratorially with their own purple bandanas, which they wore tightly wrapped around their heads, in a somewhat inappropriate campaign for "Free Fanny". The Hypatia though, acting all librarian-cum-disciplinarian, scolded the two for being immature. The Jazzme knowing on which side is bread was buttered immediately complied, and Trout Montague reluctantly followed suit.

An orange-doored white taxi was parked, some might say abandoned out front of the farmstead. After the commotion that accompanied the "Free Fanny" shenanigans, all was now quiet but for a biting Arctic wind which whistled waltzes and caterwauled Country and Western in the clear night sky. At first glance, the farmstead appeared uninhabited, perhaps deserted, like the orange-doored white taxi itself. Ben had surely come, come and gone. But instinct informed the mismatched menagerie that another presence presided precisely here.

It was Orchid who is credited with having found it.

"Thee, thee, thee what I've dithcovered ... a thpider hole ... thith pieth of polythtywene theet ith conthealing a thpider hole ... let uth thee whath inthide ..."

Only Trout Montague and Pinniped could take any semblance of benefit from the spray that accompanied Orchid's excitement. Boots shook itself wildly, compounding Jazzme's and Hypatia's consternation. Then they lifted the polystyrene sheet ...

A somewhat haggard figure lay at the foot of the hidey-hole, docile and seemingly resigned to his disclosure, his ungroomed hair and salt-and-pepper beard evidence of a life of itinerant subterfuge.

"We got 'im", ejaculated Pinniped triumphantly, but, as it was about to transpire, somewhat prematurely.

Boots, hearing keen as mustard, had sensed the approach of 600 members of the United States 4th Infantry Division. Circling wildly, tongue wagging, the hound managed to convey the same to the balance of the party.

"Damn ..." muttered Pinniped. The flash of orange in the beard had been game up for the Penguin. This was the closest they'd come to catching Pingu, only now to be thwarted by fifty dozen GI Joes. "Damn damn damn ..."

And with that, the misalliance evaporated into the night, apparently in search of ancient land.

Upsalla, Tupsalla....

Meanwhile, in an equal but seperate segment of the universe, MoG is begrudgingly fulfilling her motherly duties by planning a birthday party for The Lad.

menu...planned.
booze...ordered.
bartenders.... hired.
portly, bearded clown with troupe of elves and sideshow of flying reindeer...booked.
invitations to all the gods, goddesses and godlings everywhere...mailed.

*sigh*

This was sooooo much simpler when The Lad was a young'un. Then I just had to rent a barn for an evening, dredge up a few unemployed wise men, invite the local shepherds, and provide wings, harps and halos with the promise of eternal exposure for some wanna-be divas, and I was done. Progress. Humph!

Upsaala is cool. Out here, though, there's a deeper cold than the soft-Sweden snow-flurry kind.

Alberta Coleridge is weeping softly, moved by Hypatia's words. The Speak-Your-Weight-Machine wears a faint smile, Trout-stirred and convinced that a few more heroes like these would suffice to forever-change the whelk-stall.

"Do you think Orchid will be home for Christmas?" whispers the old bird, laying her loneliness bare.

Her immense companion shakes his head slowly, thoughtfully.

"And Pinniped?"

He fixes her with his dark eye, inscrutable as ever. But they are both wondering if they will ever see the little seal again.

Handy finding the Uppsalla internet cafe thought the dog even though the weather was considerably worse than inclement. They could have chosen a better spot for it though, communal urinals were hardly the highs or even the lows of comfort.
He'd tried howling a message home but that had merely attracted unwanted attention from the wolves and quite frankly with Jazzme as her protector Hypatia would have been in grave peril... Romantics were not the most practical of companions on dangerous expeditions, good for the soul though and someone had to sell the story to the Hollywood distributers.
They'd done well with the locations, three cities and now an ice wilderness worthy of Zhivago...or was that Lawrence? Sand and snow could be so deceptive and equally cold.
His nose dripped and his paws too cold could barely hit the keys. The spell check was locked into Serbo Croat or was it Batvian?

The quays reminded him of warmer climes and the spell check sign beamed back at him in dayglo orange. Why would the spell check sign be orange? he pondered. Somewhere deeply buried in threads gone by a warning bell exploded in his pounding, nay almost delirious head...perhaps he should see if anyone had an aspirin...

Too late he realised he had unleashed the thing called Pingu! He had to warn the others...

Jazz shivered in the cold , it was not his intention to remain in these Northern climes, even Europe had been cold this time of year.

He considered the option offered by Hypatia and settled for Crete - Agios Nicolas was a lively little spot but surrounded by countryside overladen with olive trees and farms. That should keep Hypatia happy and he could sit and paint in the warm sun.

Who knows, the Mog may even show them some of her paintings - but they sounded unlikely to be Christmas scenes.

And as for that spider hole - what a pity that American hadn't thrown his hand-grenade in after all.

Trout Montague was confessedly not uninspired by the imminence of a trip to the more subtly ambient climes of Ancient Crete. Of late, he’d certainly become habituated to being surrounded by Cretins, and frankly felt at home among them. A Mediterranean island full of like-minded individuals couldn’t be so bad. Somewhat content, Trout Montague settled back into the book that he’d picked up in Paris and had discretely secreted into Hypatia’s sack, an action which in view of the potential literal confusion with small cloud-shaped stains of fishy reproductory fluid needed to be read utterly in context. The book itself “En Route” by one Jacques Chirouac was, appropriately, a sort of travelogue, about a French politician who changed with the wind.

But what was it the wind had whispered to them all only hours before?

"Upsalla, Tup ..."

"Hmmm," thought Trout Montague ... "Tup, tup, tup ..." as if he needed any encouragement in that department. Pinniped then ejaculated abruptly, and somewhat tautologically it seems.

"Trout I’d say that Ben’s Bus came from Tupelo, Mississippi;
I’ll tell you now that grown men cry and Irish girls are pretty", proclaimed the seal in a thick Edinburgh burr, and for no apparent reason.

"I took the bus to streets that I could walk down;
I walked the streets to find the one I’d looked for ...", muttered the Hypatia, ambiguously, deliberately not revealing whether it was Ben or the Jazzme about whom she spoke.

"... Thought that I was finished, Thought that I was complete;
Thought that I was whole instead of being half of something;
Thought that I was growing, growing older, wiser;
Understanding why this world held nothing for my spirit;
Thought that I was destined,
Destined to be nothing,
Destined to be nothing in this world and then I met you ..." rhymed the Jazzme, heart-on-sleeve, as was his wont.

"... And I can thay THethkatchewan without tharting to thutter ..." retorted Orchid, with a customary blizzard of sleet.

Trout Montague and Waz stood bemused, seemingly unaffected by the proliferation of proclamations. Then Waz turned to Trout ...

"Ancient Crete then? I could walk 500 miles. And I would walk 500 more ..."

"No," Trout cut off the Lammergeier before it could haver any further, "... sod walking. We’ll go parcel post."

Trout Montague was confessedly not uninspired by the imminence of a trip to the more subtly ambient climes of Ancient Crete. Of late, he'd certainly become habituated to being surrounded by Cretins, and frankly felt at home among them. A Mediterranean island full of like-minded individuals couldn't be so bad. Somewhat content, Trout Montague settled back into the book that he'd picked up in Paris and had discretely secreted into Hypatia's sack, an action which in view of the potential literal confusion with small cloud-shaped stains of fishy reproductory fluid needed to be read utterly in context. The book itself "En Route" by one Jacques Chirouac was, appropriately, a sort of travelogue, about a French politician who changed with the wind.

But what was it the wind had whispered to them all only hours before?

"Upsalla, Tup ..."

"Hmmm," thought Trout Montague ... "Tup, tup, tup ..." as if he needed any encouragement in that department. Pinniped then ejaculated abruptly, and somewhat tautologically it seems.

"Trout I'd say that Ben's Bus came from Tupelo, Mississippi;
I'll tell you now that grown men cry and Irish girls are pretty", proclaimed the seal in a thick Edinburgh burr, and for no apparent reason.

"I took the bus to streets that I could walk down;
I walked the streets to find the one I'd looked for ...", muttered the Hypatia, ambiguously, deliberately not revealing whether it was Ben or the Jazzme about whom she spoke.

"... Thought that I was finished, Thought that I was complete;
Thought that I was whole instead of being half of something;
Thought that I was growing, growing older, wiser;
Understanding why this world held nothing for my spirit;
Thought that I was destined,
Destined to be nothing,
Destined to be nothing in this world and then I met you ..." rhymed the Jazzme, heart-on-sleeve, as was his wont.

"... And I can thay THethkatchewan without tharting to thutter ..." retorted Orchid, with a customary blizzard of sleet.

Trout Montague and Waz stood bemused, seemingly unaffected by the proliferation of proclamations. Then Waz turned to Trout ...

"Ancient Crete then? I could walk 500 miles. And I would walk 500 more ..."

"No," Trout cut off the Lammergeier before it could haver any further, "... sod walking. We'll go parcel post."