2.16.2005
The cult of Douglas Adams
I am hooked on Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy. I listen to Douglas Adams reading his books, on audiotape from the library, at bedtime every night (it drowns out the voices in my head and is cheaper than valium). I always have a set of tapes checked out and I wore out one set last year - I wonder if my library will catch on to my compulsive behavior, and if so, what they will say about it.
It's hard to say if the effects of this addiction, individually or together, are positive or negative. I'm getting to where I can recite the books. I'm getting good sleep. The stories are becoming background noise. I can't listen to Douglas Adams read anything when I drive, because my eyelids get all heavy and my brainwave pattern shifts toward sleep.
If I have to be compulsive about an author, Douglas Adams is probably a sound choice - his stories hang together well, his science is solid, he is wicked funny. And Stats class is a lot more fun if you think of a white running-shoe ship every time the teacher mentions "probability." I am incredibly grateful for being turned on to Richard Dawkins's work via his connection to Douglas Adams. On the mental health front, it's good to have Arthur Dent in your head to compare yourself with, because on any given day you're probably doing well by that standard.
All this is segueway to the fact that the trailer to the H2G2 movie (release date May 6) is headlining at Amazon.com today. You can go direct to the movie website, or read a Q&A with the director and producer here. I haven't been over to Garth and Nick's homepage, Tongsville, since last summer, but it was wicked cool then (warning: big big site, too big to view at home, and too noisy for sneaking over to it on your cubicle computer).
I was worried that I wouldn't like the redesign of Marvin the paranoid android when all I knew was that Warwick Davis would be playing him. No worries now - the little robot is wonderfully expressive and depressed in the pictures available today. I loved Zooey Dechanel's performance in Elf and look forward to seeing her take on Trillian. I hope to hear notes of both the "vaguely Arabic," thoughtful Trillian in the books and the bubbly Trillian played by Sandra Dickinson in 1981.
I think I had better get back to work now.
It's hard to say if the effects of this addiction, individually or together, are positive or negative. I'm getting to where I can recite the books. I'm getting good sleep. The stories are becoming background noise. I can't listen to Douglas Adams read anything when I drive, because my eyelids get all heavy and my brainwave pattern shifts toward sleep.
If I have to be compulsive about an author, Douglas Adams is probably a sound choice - his stories hang together well, his science is solid, he is wicked funny. And Stats class is a lot more fun if you think of a white running-shoe ship every time the teacher mentions "probability." I am incredibly grateful for being turned on to Richard Dawkins's work via his connection to Douglas Adams. On the mental health front, it's good to have Arthur Dent in your head to compare yourself with, because on any given day you're probably doing well by that standard.
All this is segueway to the fact that the trailer to the H2G2 movie (release date May 6) is headlining at Amazon.com today. You can go direct to the movie website, or read a Q&A with the director and producer here. I haven't been over to Garth and Nick's homepage, Tongsville, since last summer, but it was wicked cool then (warning: big big site, too big to view at home, and too noisy for sneaking over to it on your cubicle computer).
I was worried that I wouldn't like the redesign of Marvin the paranoid android when all I knew was that Warwick Davis would be playing him. No worries now - the little robot is wonderfully expressive and depressed in the pictures available today. I loved Zooey Dechanel's performance in Elf and look forward to seeing her take on Trillian. I hope to hear notes of both the "vaguely Arabic," thoughtful Trillian in the books and the bubbly Trillian played by Sandra Dickinson in 1981.
I think I had better get back to work now.
