Don't panic

[pscot]

and don't forget your towel.

A towel, it says, is about the most massively useful thing an interstellar hitchhiker can have. Partly it has great practical value. You can wrap it around you for warmth as you bound across the cold moons of Jaglan Beta; you can lie on it on the brilliant marble-sanded beaches of Santraginus V, inhaling the heady sea vapors; you can sleep under it beneath the stars which shine so redly on the desert world of Kakrafoon; use it to sail a miniraft down the slow heavy River Moth; wet it for use in hand-to-hand-combat; wrap it round your head to ward off noxious fumes or avoid the gaze of the Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal (such a mind-bogglingly stupid animal, it assumes that if you can't see it, it can't see you); you can wave your towel in emergencies as a distress signal, and of course dry yourself off with it if it still seems to be clean enough.
More importantly, a towel has immense psychological value. For some reason, if a strag (strag: non-hitch hiker) discovers that a hitch hiker has his towel with him, he will automatically assume that he is also in possession of a toothbrush, face flannel, soap, tin of biscuits, flask, compass, map, ball of string, gnat spray, wet weather gear, space suit etc., etc. Furthermore, the strag will then happily lend the hitch hiker any of these or a dozen other items that the hitch hiker might accidentally have "lost". What the strag will think is that any man who can hitch the length and breadth of the galaxy, rough it, slum it, struggle against terrible odds, win through, and still knows where his towel is is clearly a man to be reckoned with.

”
— Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

[iscooterliberally]

1. "There is a theory which states...

...that if ever anybody discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable. There is another theory which states that this has already happened." - Douglas Adams

[pscot]

2. I'm afraid it's happening again

even as we speak.

[glitch]

3. Lol! welcome to DU! nt

[iscooterliberally]

4. Thanks!

I've been lurking here for a while. I usually don't get to post much, but it's slow today.

[RandomThoughts]

5. Snap!

:applause:


That is great :D LOL

A very cheerful thing to think on.


My favorite part was the improbability drive, when a bowl of petunias and a whale powered the ship drive.

I remember thinking for days about that, the most improbable of situations, and the Petunias says "oh no not this again."

There was great joy in that, I thought on that for weeks, I read the book while living in a van and working freight at a grocery store, chips and salsa after work, and a bottle of Jack, good memories about reading that book.

I think about that book every time I see one of the face palm images.

[nadinbrzezinski]

6. Don't forget the flower pattern

that is where the vitamins are

Welcome to DU

[cilla4progress]

7. I guess there's something liberating

once you realize all hope is lost?

Sorry for the downer...good; got it out of my system at least.

[GoneOffShore]

8. I had my towel all day and am sitting on it as I type.