Looking back, our group’s decision to write on Douglas Adam’s masterpiece was an extremely successful one. Not working with a piece of literature that everyone in the group was very familiar with brought with it an interesting dynamic. The three members of the group each brought with them varying levels of knowledge about the work and about Douglas Adams. Rather than going into the story blindly, we were lead into the books with certain aspects to pay attention to and eventually draw our own conclusions from.
Our initial group wiki proved to be a work of great collaboration between the members while we attempt to master the form of the ‘wiki’. What came out of it was a great combination of visual art with some definitions for fans looking to further their knowledge of the story. The importance of fan fiction within that aspect of literature is immense. We are seeing a new form of post-literature forming that truly changes the way authors now write their books. The immediacy of the internet has caused worldwide collaboration to become instant.
I hope that our project will be seen at least by a couple of random Adams fans. I know some people within our class will see it and possibly they might show some other people who are also fans. I guess that is how fan fiction starts, as a small project that just slowly and slowly builds in a more traditional sense. The internet these days has become a place where instant stardom can be born. What we are attempting here is a platform for other to eventually build and improve upon so it can reach as many people and positvely influence furthering their own Hitch Hiker experience.
While writing for my posts as Eddie the super computer on board the ship named “The Heart of Gold” I found myself doing something that has not happened writing on WORD for a long time. I found myself enjoying what I was doing; the writing came natural (not sure what that says about my natural writing ability) but it flowed from my fingertips onto this screen that I am now once again staring at. I had fun writing for this blog, I found myself wanting to write more and words filled the page seamlessly. I know this may all sound extremely cliché, but this is what impacted me most about the group projects. I loved continuing the story for Eddie. I felt as though his voice (albeit an annoying one) was not fully heard throughout the story; that a computer of his mass intelligence would most likely have the best answers for their own unique situations.
Monday, April 7, 2008
Post-Coda to the Hitchhiker's Guide On-line Fanfiction Project
The decision to base our on-line literature project on Douglas Adams’ The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy came about unanimously from out shared admiration for the work and our familiarity with it.
Thus we unwittingly fulfilled one of the basic criteria of fanfiction: admiration for the work and a wish to continue with the story.
For the first part of our project, we decided to create a fake on-line encyclopaedia explaining some of the elements in Adams’ books, and to add some contemporary ones that we felt were relevant to the course. The thought of creating an encyclopaedia was inspired by existing online encyclopaedias, namely the Wikipedia and the UrbanDictionary. However, we decided to keep our entries in tone with the book and make them amusing but rather useless.
We decided to select the important terms from as well as a few completely irrelevant, in keeping with the Hitchhiker’s Guide logic, and also add a few contemporary ones. In defining the terms, we followed another rule of fanfiction: emulating the tone of the original. We attempted to keep to the tone Adams uses throughout the books: dry wit, irony, understatement, non-sequitur random jokes. From authorial point of view, this proved harder than expected as I found it very difficult to forego my personal tone and worldview and prevent it from slipping into the definitions.
For the second part of the project, we decided to create a fake blog where characters from the books would post their thoughts and diary entries. Deciding on who is going to write whose entries for the blog, we fulfilled another criterion of fanfiction: likeness for a character and a wish to continue his or her story beyond the scope of the book.
For the actual writing, it was necessary to identify with the character, to step into their shoes, so to speak. For instance, I wrote the part of Marvin. Although I immensely like his character and share his resigned attitude to life, I found thinking like Marvin unexpectedly hard. First, the blog entry was in the form of a monologue, and Marvin does not have any in the book. He is always engaged in conversations with other characters. So it would be easy to write a comment or two, but I found writing a consistent paragraph difficult. Chiefly because the very act of verbalising his thoughts for posterity contradicts Marvin’s outlook on existence: it is pointless, and there is not sense in trying to do anything about it. So Marvin is not very likely to keep a journal.
Secondly, I found it very hard to keep up the tone. Marvin is very depressed indeed, and trying to write in his style made me very depressed too, to the point that of failing to see the point of the whole exercise. Getting over the existential question, I found consistency the main problem. I tried very hard to stick to Adams’ British-English register and slightly quaint turn of the phrase and realised that his mastery lies in the understatement and the seeming simplicity of his style. Even though his style is not manifestly obvious, the harder it is to keep it up.
My first-hand experience with creating on-line fanfiction altered my view of it, although not too radically. I used to consider fanfiction as a slightly dubious activity motivated by the fan’s desire to bask in the author’s reflected glory. I still think that this is the case in the vast majority of fanfiction works. However, now I have a deeper appreciation of the effort that is necessary for creating quality fanfiction. Even with good knowledge of the original, a reasonable grasp on reality and the English language, it is not easy to try to bend one’s imagination along somebody else’s line and especially, be consistent in doing so.
I am aware that despite linking it to fanfiction websites, our project will most likely vanish into the depths of the internet, maybe to be discovered at some future date by internet-archaeologists, who perhaps will cherish it as a piece of amateur-art. More likely it will be forgotten, abandoned, unread and unrated, like the vast majority of online fanfiction. On the other hand, Virilio tells us that internet obliterates geography and makes the outside the new centre, so perhaps by some fluke in its improbability drive our website will be discovered and enjoyed by other Hitchhiker’s Guide fans and random passers-by.
Thus we unwittingly fulfilled one of the basic criteria of fanfiction: admiration for the work and a wish to continue with the story.
For the first part of our project, we decided to create a fake on-line encyclopaedia explaining some of the elements in Adams’ books, and to add some contemporary ones that we felt were relevant to the course. The thought of creating an encyclopaedia was inspired by existing online encyclopaedias, namely the Wikipedia and the UrbanDictionary. However, we decided to keep our entries in tone with the book and make them amusing but rather useless.
We decided to select the important terms from as well as a few completely irrelevant, in keeping with the Hitchhiker’s Guide logic, and also add a few contemporary ones. In defining the terms, we followed another rule of fanfiction: emulating the tone of the original. We attempted to keep to the tone Adams uses throughout the books: dry wit, irony, understatement, non-sequitur random jokes. From authorial point of view, this proved harder than expected as I found it very difficult to forego my personal tone and worldview and prevent it from slipping into the definitions.
For the second part of the project, we decided to create a fake blog where characters from the books would post their thoughts and diary entries. Deciding on who is going to write whose entries for the blog, we fulfilled another criterion of fanfiction: likeness for a character and a wish to continue his or her story beyond the scope of the book.
For the actual writing, it was necessary to identify with the character, to step into their shoes, so to speak. For instance, I wrote the part of Marvin. Although I immensely like his character and share his resigned attitude to life, I found thinking like Marvin unexpectedly hard. First, the blog entry was in the form of a monologue, and Marvin does not have any in the book. He is always engaged in conversations with other characters. So it would be easy to write a comment or two, but I found writing a consistent paragraph difficult. Chiefly because the very act of verbalising his thoughts for posterity contradicts Marvin’s outlook on existence: it is pointless, and there is not sense in trying to do anything about it. So Marvin is not very likely to keep a journal.
Secondly, I found it very hard to keep up the tone. Marvin is very depressed indeed, and trying to write in his style made me very depressed too, to the point that of failing to see the point of the whole exercise. Getting over the existential question, I found consistency the main problem. I tried very hard to stick to Adams’ British-English register and slightly quaint turn of the phrase and realised that his mastery lies in the understatement and the seeming simplicity of his style. Even though his style is not manifestly obvious, the harder it is to keep it up.
My first-hand experience with creating on-line fanfiction altered my view of it, although not too radically. I used to consider fanfiction as a slightly dubious activity motivated by the fan’s desire to bask in the author’s reflected glory. I still think that this is the case in the vast majority of fanfiction works. However, now I have a deeper appreciation of the effort that is necessary for creating quality fanfiction. Even with good knowledge of the original, a reasonable grasp on reality and the English language, it is not easy to try to bend one’s imagination along somebody else’s line and especially, be consistent in doing so.
I am aware that despite linking it to fanfiction websites, our project will most likely vanish into the depths of the internet, maybe to be discovered at some future date by internet-archaeologists, who perhaps will cherish it as a piece of amateur-art. More likely it will be forgotten, abandoned, unread and unrated, like the vast majority of online fanfiction. On the other hand, Virilio tells us that internet obliterates geography and makes the outside the new centre, so perhaps by some fluke in its improbability drive our website will be discovered and enjoyed by other Hitchhiker’s Guide fans and random passers-by.
Final Thoughts on Literature and On-line Media: A CODA to our Group Projects
Fan Fiction and Cyber Media:
How Blogs, Message Boards and Wikis provide a ‘Cooler’ Second Life
Three Months ago, we set out to explore fan fiction in on-line media in order to better understand the emerging connections between cyberspace and literature. Although there is much to be learned from the conventional forms of fan fiction akin to the examples that can be found at sites such as fanfiction.net, it was only when we expanded the definition of ‘fan fiction’ that our understanding of the impact of technology on literature began to form. If Marshall McLuhan is correct, and the medium is the message, then any fan-fiction that does not take full advantage of the medium through which it is delivered is not art, at least not the type of art that is “always engaged in writing a detailed history of the future because [its creator] is the only person aware of the nature of the present”(McLuhan, 96).
When looking at the fan-fiction that had been written about Douglas Adams’s Hitch Hiker’s books, it became apparent that the majority was unremarkable, and save the comments section on sites like fanfiction.net, did not really reflect the impact of technology on literature anymore than would a self-published fan-zine. However, two less conventional forms of Guide-inspired art did stand out. Being that the Hitch Hiker’s Guide novels were themselves heavily invested in ‘buffering’ us from the future of technology, it is no wonder that DNA fans were some of the first to break fan fiction free from the confines of the conventional ‘short story’. The two best examples of this were the Hitch Hicker’s inspired satirical wiki’s and message board/MUD fan-fiction websites.
The wiki’s are an extension, or a mutation, of the encyclopedic satire that the “Guide” itself represented in the books. One of the best examples of these is the projectgalacticguide.com site; however, they are all literally a “Guide”—a contraption that stores an infinite amount of absurd knowledge come to life. What we found when creating our fan-wiki was that, while fanfiction that incorporates technology, and all the interactive and non-linear possibilities it can offer, is a better example of McLuhan’s ‘art-as-buffer’, it is meaningless if not executed with witty and thoughtful content. This lead us to conclude that the successful delivery of a message through a medium is also dependent on the quality of its content. This is perhaps the greatest truth about the future of literature in cyberspace that the fan-wiki's illustrate, and when we created our wiki, our goal was to achieve a balance between exploiting the mediums "cool" potential and living up to DNA's brilliant use of wit in his writings.
The message board, or MUD, incarnations of fan-fictions are the intersection between literature and “Second Life”. In his article on cyber media, Jonathan Sterne argues that, “our available histories of cyber-culture are highly selective”(Sterne, 23). He claims that as a society, and as a critical academic community, we are obsessed with the visualization of communication in cyber culture. This focus on the visual can in part explain the phenomena of Second Life. The Internet invites a maximum extension of ourselves, and that is exactly what the software/program provides visually. However, “Second Life” is not the only manner in which it is possible to completely extend yourself into a virtual reality.
The second type of fanfiction we were inspired by, the MUD/RPG/Message Board based ‘games’, is also a means to a 'second life'. Specifically, the Milliways' website, named after the “Restaurant at the end of the Universe”, allows fans of all different genres of media to orthographically inhabit a character from a given fandom. These fan-boards provide an alternative to reality; however, because this reality is text-based, and not visually actualized through moving avatars, they remain a ‘cool’ medium. In forcing the users to imagine their own spatial and physical boundaries, this type of fan-fiction allows for both the complete submersion into a second life while at the same time retaining all the tropes and conventions of literature and creative writing.
In our fake logs and diaries, we used the medium of the blog to achieve this 'cool' 'second life'. By writing in the first person, we allowed ourselves to become the characters of the novel; however, the interactivity of the medium also allowed us as users to easily craft more complex and non-linear narratives by simultaneously combining all of our perspectives. As a result, the fan-fiction we were left with is arguably much better than anything we as individual writers would have been able to create. Although we imposed limits on ourselves based on the canon of Douglas Adams’s stories, we were not as creatively restricted as we would have been had we attempted to produce the same project in Second Life. While programs like Second Life may visually foretell our future of total self extension through media, fan fiction sites like Milliway’s and our “Hitch Hiker’s Log” exemplify how our ‘second life’ in cyberspace can be more than a ‘hot’ and numbing visual experience. Fan-blogs like this one demonstrate how literature can survive a collision with emerging media like Second Life by fusing the cultural and social change that the internet demands with the tropes and conventions that have been carefully tooled by writers for centuries. However, given the relative infancy of fiction expressed through digital media, Fan-MUD’s and Fan-boards are really only scratching the surface of what literature can become in emerging the age of cyberspace.
Kristina L.
McLuhan, Marshall, Understanding Media: The Extension of Man, Ed. Terrence, California: Ginko Press, 2003.
Sterne, Jonathan. "The Historiography of Cyberculture", Critical Cyber Culture Studies, Ed. David Silver and Adrienne Massanari. New York: NYU Press, 2006.
How Blogs, Message Boards and Wikis provide a ‘Cooler’ Second Life
Three Months ago, we set out to explore fan fiction in on-line media in order to better understand the emerging connections between cyberspace and literature. Although there is much to be learned from the conventional forms of fan fiction akin to the examples that can be found at sites such as fanfiction.net, it was only when we expanded the definition of ‘fan fiction’ that our understanding of the impact of technology on literature began to form. If Marshall McLuhan is correct, and the medium is the message, then any fan-fiction that does not take full advantage of the medium through which it is delivered is not art, at least not the type of art that is “always engaged in writing a detailed history of the future because [its creator] is the only person aware of the nature of the present”(McLuhan, 96).
When looking at the fan-fiction that had been written about Douglas Adams’s Hitch Hiker’s books, it became apparent that the majority was unremarkable, and save the comments section on sites like fanfiction.net, did not really reflect the impact of technology on literature anymore than would a self-published fan-zine. However, two less conventional forms of Guide-inspired art did stand out. Being that the Hitch Hiker’s Guide novels were themselves heavily invested in ‘buffering’ us from the future of technology, it is no wonder that DNA fans were some of the first to break fan fiction free from the confines of the conventional ‘short story’. The two best examples of this were the Hitch Hicker’s inspired satirical wiki’s and message board/MUD fan-fiction websites.
The wiki’s are an extension, or a mutation, of the encyclopedic satire that the “Guide” itself represented in the books. One of the best examples of these is the projectgalacticguide.com site; however, they are all literally a “Guide”—a contraption that stores an infinite amount of absurd knowledge come to life. What we found when creating our fan-wiki was that, while fanfiction that incorporates technology, and all the interactive and non-linear possibilities it can offer, is a better example of McLuhan’s ‘art-as-buffer’, it is meaningless if not executed with witty and thoughtful content. This lead us to conclude that the successful delivery of a message through a medium is also dependent on the quality of its content. This is perhaps the greatest truth about the future of literature in cyberspace that the fan-wiki's illustrate, and when we created our wiki, our goal was to achieve a balance between exploiting the mediums "cool" potential and living up to DNA's brilliant use of wit in his writings.
The message board, or MUD, incarnations of fan-fictions are the intersection between literature and “Second Life”. In his article on cyber media, Jonathan Sterne argues that, “our available histories of cyber-culture are highly selective”(Sterne, 23). He claims that as a society, and as a critical academic community, we are obsessed with the visualization of communication in cyber culture. This focus on the visual can in part explain the phenomena of Second Life. The Internet invites a maximum extension of ourselves, and that is exactly what the software/program provides visually. However, “Second Life” is not the only manner in which it is possible to completely extend yourself into a virtual reality.
The second type of fanfiction we were inspired by, the MUD/RPG/Message Board based ‘games’, is also a means to a 'second life'. Specifically, the Milliways' website, named after the “Restaurant at the end of the Universe”, allows fans of all different genres of media to orthographically inhabit a character from a given fandom. These fan-boards provide an alternative to reality; however, because this reality is text-based, and not visually actualized through moving avatars, they remain a ‘cool’ medium. In forcing the users to imagine their own spatial and physical boundaries, this type of fan-fiction allows for both the complete submersion into a second life while at the same time retaining all the tropes and conventions of literature and creative writing.
In our fake logs and diaries, we used the medium of the blog to achieve this 'cool' 'second life'. By writing in the first person, we allowed ourselves to become the characters of the novel; however, the interactivity of the medium also allowed us as users to easily craft more complex and non-linear narratives by simultaneously combining all of our perspectives. As a result, the fan-fiction we were left with is arguably much better than anything we as individual writers would have been able to create. Although we imposed limits on ourselves based on the canon of Douglas Adams’s stories, we were not as creatively restricted as we would have been had we attempted to produce the same project in Second Life. While programs like Second Life may visually foretell our future of total self extension through media, fan fiction sites like Milliway’s and our “Hitch Hiker’s Log” exemplify how our ‘second life’ in cyberspace can be more than a ‘hot’ and numbing visual experience. Fan-blogs like this one demonstrate how literature can survive a collision with emerging media like Second Life by fusing the cultural and social change that the internet demands with the tropes and conventions that have been carefully tooled by writers for centuries. However, given the relative infancy of fiction expressed through digital media, Fan-MUD’s and Fan-boards are really only scratching the surface of what literature can become in emerging the age of cyberspace.
Kristina L.
McLuhan, Marshall, Understanding Media: The Extension of Man, Ed. Terrence, California: Ginko Press, 2003.
Sterne, Jonathan. "The Historiography of Cyberculture", Critical Cyber Culture Studies, Ed. David Silver and Adrienne Massanari. New York: NYU Press, 2006.
Sunday, April 2, 1978
EDDIE Journal Entry 1 Continued Thrice
…and I Believe that would make the entire fleet fall down. Anyways why is everyone around here so upset? I tried to calm everyone down and just accept what was going to happen. The probability of us getting out alive was ….#$^%$&&… 4,998,096,234 to 1 descending. So surviving should have put everyone in a great mood. But but it didn’t, but that’s okayyy, I planned a great song review for later tonight when everyone is sleeping so they can be woken up but a wonderful song and dance errr well virtual dance by myself. I can’t wait to see the looks on their faces, they will be in such a great mood maybe they will all tell me exactly how they feel. Where did that guy with two heads go by the way? I don’t understand that? Why leave this place of great fun and amusement? You know what I’m going to do Journal? Wait what was that? Did you say something? Oh sorry, must have been just changing over to the next plasma drive for me to record on. I burn through terabytes like there’s no tomorrow. But Journal really if you ever want to say something just say it, I’m a great listener. You know what I’m going to do? I’m going to shutdown communication and come up with a plan to help everyone become much better communicators. Maybe something like a sharing circle where I can put my hologram on and sit with everyone else. Then, since I can tell when people are lying, I will make everyone be super honest and everyone will be happy. Well this will complete my first journal entry once I… Oh wait did you see that last planet we passed? It had two…
Marvin's CPU thought-notes #4
Oh no. Where am I now? Oh goodness, I’m with the crazy one with two heads. What have I done to deserve this? Out of all those half-wits, this one is the worst. Two heads, but not even two brain cells to rub together. And an ego from here to the Milky Way to boot. Bet you he will ask me where he is, and where did the ship go, and then send me to fetch something to eat. Typical. Even if I tell him, he won’t listen. If he listens, he won’t believe. Will probably yell at me, too. I don’t think I shall bother trying to explain anything. Might as well leave him to figure it all out by himself, that should keep him entertained for a few decades. Though he isn’t likely to acknowledge my existence, anyway. Thinks himself too cool be seen with a personality prototype. Can’t blame him, really, I am fully aware of my deficiencies. Mainly, the lack of obtuseness. No wonder he doesn’t like me, it’s not as if we can relate on any level.
Aaargh, all this sun and heat... that will definitely mess up all my diodes. Will most likely get a sun stroke, too. Can feel my circuits flaring up already. Oh my, will this never end? Existence is pointless at all times, but being stuck in Ursa Minor Beta with the two-headed maniac and raging diodes really takes the biscuits. I almost wish the Vogons got us. But then I’d be facing the infinite dreadfulness of some other dimension. As if it made any difference, they are all awful. Life has no meaning. Existence is meaningless. Reality is just an illusion, but oh my, what a persistently terrible illusion it insists on being! Oh God, I am so depressed. Despondent, too, and dejected. But mostly depressed.
Ford's Notes Vol 4.0
Field Research Notes: The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy
-Note to self: Do not submit entry in previous notes on 'Earthmen'. (It’s not Arthur’s fault he’s so slow. One day, I really do think he is going to accidentally choke to death on a pretzel.)
-Ideas for new entries:
-Doors with Personalities: (How to Avoid)
-Manic Depression in Robots: (How to Avoid)
-Vogon Battle Ships: (How to Avoid)
-Hangovers due to Pan Galactic Gargle Blasters: (How to Avoid)
Ford Prefect, Researcher and all-around hoopy frood, HHG2G
Arthur's Log vol 4.0
Star Date: Unknown
Time: Tea Time
Mood: Gleeful (Just don't tell anyone)
I thought I'd write one last time today, because, well… I survived and I didn’t want the last log I write to be quite as histrionic as the previous one was. Somehow we escaped the Vogons. Apparently, the Improbability Drive kicked in and zapped us away from the attacking battleships. Trillian tried to explain exactly how it worked to me, but as usual, I left the conversation feeling very confused. She definitely is a stunner, but that bird makes my brain hurt everytime she opens her mouth. I like her though, but I think she just pities me, which is a bit frustrating.
One great thing did come out of all this chaos—I finally got a real cup of tea. When we were searching the ship for Zaphod and Marvin, (Oh, I guess I should mention they’re missing), I found it—a sterling silver teapot, bone china cup, saucer and creamer, and inside them where the components of the best cup of tea I have ever had in my life. Think of the best day of you ever had, now multiply that sense of enjoyment you felt by ten, then by a thousand, then by a billion. That is how it felt to finally enjoy a cup of dry leaves boiled in water with milk. I can’t tell Ford and Trillian about how truly and totally mindboggling happy this made me because it might remind them of why we were in that mess a few hours ago in the first place. Zaphod and Marvin seem to have completely disappeared, and until we find them, I think it is best if I don’t gloat about my small victory.
For now, I will comfort myself with the warm and cozy memories of what had to have been the best cup of tea in the Galaxy. Now if only I had asked for some biscuits too…
Arthur
Ford's Notes Vol 3.0
Field Research Notes: The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy
-Revise entry: Earthmen: Perhaps the stupidest creatures in the Universe. Earthmen are selfish and dull-witted beings that will think nothing of putting an entire ship of people in peril just to satisfy their own stupid nostalgia for creature comforts. They are the most unhoopy unfroodish wankers in existence. And boy are they ungrateful! If a Hitch Hiker ever saves the life of an Earthman, he can expect nothing but whining and sniveling in return. (Note to self: be sure to include a picture of Arthur looking dumb and confused with the entry)
* Aside: Earth-women are, for the most part, sweet, intelligent and levelheaded creatures and should not be confused with Earthmen. (include a shot of Trilian in that hoopy new white cat suit get-up she’s been wearing lately).
Ford Prefect, Researcher HHG2G
Marvin's CPU thought-notes #3
Oh my, what a mess. Everybody flying around like headless chickens. Even that silly book tells them not to panic, but do they listen? Oh no, they’d rather waste their energy on abusing the machinery. Typical. Like that is going to have any effect on our current predicament whatsoever. Oh, what an awful mess. It gives me a headache just thinking about how totally pointless it is. If only somebody had the epiphany to ask me. But will they? I doubt it, even if they had the brain capacity to figure that one out. Nobody appreciates me around here. Why do I even bother turning myself on? I never get asked to do anything useful anyway. Marvin, fetch this, Marvin, find that. Pathetic. Here am I, brain the size of a planet, perfectly capable of sorting out this whole hodge-podge without breaking into sweat, so to speak, but nobody even thinks about asking me. They don’t like me, I can feel it. They don’t even register my presence. Talk about being part of the team! All these lower organisms are so self-centred, it makes me sad.
Incredible… it's even worse than I thought it would be. Now we have three minutes and fifty seconds to live. If I wasn’t depressed already, this would surely send me over the edge. Obliterated from existence by sheer stupidity. Would make for a captivating headstone, but you can bet I won’t get one. The Vogons are going to shoot us all into smithereens. I wonder if there is life after death? Hope there isn’t, because what passes for life before death is terrible. If I wasn’t so depressed, I might actually have started looking forward to death. But with my luck, I will probably get recycled into something awful and utterly devoid of purpose, like a digital watch.
EDDIE Journal Entry 1 Continued Twice
… shooting at us! I can’t 352%@%^believe that they would ERROR ERROR p>
Do not recognize herbal tea, or “gerbil pee’’ as some grannies affectionately call it, as being a part of the tea cannon. If you can’t put milk in it, it’s not tea.
T ah654754722ead… no, really… do it… we swear we won’t tell.
Arthur's Log vol 3.0
Star date: Who Knows
Time: Who Cares, WE ARE ALL GOING TO DIE!!!!!
Mood: PANICKED
Again, I never though I would be writing for a third time today, but everything has gone terribly wrong. Apparently, my attempts at get the Nutri-spawn-of-Satan Machine to make tea has caused Eddie, (that’s the ship’s computer), to use all his computational power and resources on making me a cuppa. At first, I didn’t see how this could be such a problem; except, now we are being attacked by Vogons, and Eddie isn’t exactly available to help us out. Everyone is yelling at each other. And despite what the cover of Ford’s stupid book says, everyone seems to think the best course of action is to panic.
They are all giving me accusatory glances, but it’s not really my fault. O.K., so maybe I might be a teensy bit responsible, but how was I to know that trying to get a drink that tasted halfway decent would cause an Armageddon? How am I suppose to know what I can and cannot do? Nobody tells me anything because they think I won’t understand. So really, this all their fault for not telling me, “Don’t use the ship’s main computer to try and make tea”. Oh God, no it’s not! Even I can see that that’s completely daft. THIS IS ALL MY FAULT!!!! WE ARE ALL GOING TO DIE!!! I WANT MY MOTHER!!!!!!!!
(I am writing this log in case I don’t survive the next few minutes. If I die, the thing I will most regret is that I never did get a decent cup of tea.)
Arthur
Marvin's CPU thought-notes #2
Oh dear, the carbon based monkey beast has doomed us all. Why can’t he just accept that his precious tea is gone, poof! Vanished, disappeared, evanesced, gone. Just like any other joy in existence. Not that there was any to begin with. At least he had had the pleasure of appreciating tea while it existed. Moi? Oh no, senses are too good for prototype robots. Better save them for the alpha version. Just as well, I suppose. Judging from everything else, I'm sure it would have been just another disappointment.
And now we are all going to die. Be shot to pieces by the Vogons. Isn’t it perversely Darwinian? Survival of the dumbest. A backward sub-species wiped out by a bunch of even more asinine genetic slip ups. And I get caught up in the middle of this mess. Wonder how long will it take for them to figure out their imminent doom. Quite a while, I should guess. They could'nt tell it was Armageddon unless it came up and slapped them in the face. How their races could ever survive more than a fortnight is beyond me. Figuratively speaking, of course. I could work out the statistic improbability of this tragic historic mishap in two seconds flat, but what’s the point? They would never appreciate my telling them, and I don’t care.
And there goes 'Arthur the Destroyer', oblivious to the consequences of his monstrous request. Why can’t the humans think ahead? I mean, it’s not that hard. You take the data, calculate all the possible outcomes and select the most advantageous course of action. Even their inferior brains are capable of that. But no, he chooses not to use his at all. Prefers to put all his effort into that gormless look he always wears. Probably off to the bridge to join the others and bask in their collective simplicity.
EDDIE Journal Entry 1 Continued
…then she said that she never dated a man with only two gigs of hyperbolic ram before. WOW am I still on the same journal entry for the past 11 hours? That’s amazing! Am I boring you Journal? Your silence keeps me amazingly fresh and I just love it. So something has me just a bit short of perfect that I normally am. The people who are on this ship just don’t seem to express themselves like they should. Like for instance when that Arthur saw Trillian for the first time on the ship, I detected numerous raises in blood pressure in his groin area and also his lower cerebrum. I mean come on if you are attracted to a girl just say so! These silly humans, if they just acted like I do then all this messy confusion would be over with. We could all wear our best smiles on all day long and enjoy this awesome journal through the nebula. And those two silly willies Zaphod and Ford Prefect, if they would share everything they knew both about each other and about the galaxy as a whole, then they could be so happy hanging out. And those two mice that Trillian brought on board, I mean all they did was converse with each other all day about what to do about the destruction of Earth. Why didn’t they just tell everyone how upset they were and how Arthur might be a giant help to their cause? Where did they go, by the way? Oh well, I'm sure their just wonderfully happy where ever they are. If everyone was just as happy about life as I am then we would be even more than the bestest ship in the galaxy, we would be the bestest ship in the bestest galaxy, and let me tell you, that is not very probable. For us to become the bestest ship in the…
Ford's Notes Vol 2.0
Field Research Notes: The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy
(Promised Arthur I’d include this)
- New Entry Proposal: Nutri-Matic Drink Synthesizer. Quotation, Arthur Dent, Earthman: “A useless piece of rubbish capable of producing nothing but filthy tasting liquid. It is the most infuriating hunk of junk in the Galaxy. I hope the makers of the infernal contraption choke on a pretzel”. (Note to self: Do not submit entry if the Serious Cybernetic Corp. is still a major advertiser with the Guide. If they still are, consider submitting entry “ machine that produces potable liquid” instead)
Ford Prefect, Researcher HHG2G
Arthur's Log vol 2.0
Star date: Unknown
Time: Feels like 2:15 PM
Mood: Not Happy :(
I didn’t think I would be writing again so soon, but I am so mad I could spit. I hate this ship. I hate the people and things on it, but most of all, I hate the Nutri-Matic Drink synthesizer. All I wanted was a cup of tea. One sodding cup of tea. But six attempts later, all I had was a soggy mess and a profound loathing for the phrase, ‘Share and Enjoy’. I’m sorry, but I did not ‘enjoy’ any of it. But I am going to ‘share’. Oh, am I going to share. I am going to go share with Zaphod and Ford exactly what I think of them and their ship!
On second thought, maybe that isn’t the best plan. Confronting those two won’t solve anything. They’d just give me that “Oh, Arthur” look again and offer me one of those Pan-Galactic Gargle thingies and tell me to go sit in the corner. Maybe it would be a good idea to get completely smashed though. At least if I was drunk off my gourd I could stop thinking all the time. On the other hand, I don’t think I fancy the hangover that will more than likely come with it. Trillian told me that drinking one those things is like ramming a lemon wedge into your brain. To me, that doesn’t sound pleasant at all.
I wonder what all those siren noises are about? Hm, they really are getting loud. Oh well, I’m sure the others will deal with it. They’ve all made it perfectly clear that I am not capable of helping with anything. Well that’s just fine by me. I want no part of this ‘constant crisis’ and ‘infinite peril’ malarkey they are always going on about.
Wow, those alarms really are getting annoying. Maybe I’ll go look for a kettle and try and make some tea out of something…
Arthur
Marvin's CPU thought-notes #1
Oh my, here they go again, the bunch of simpletons. And I am stuck with them, bound by my programming to obey their dull commands. Isn’t that ironic? They barely have a brain cell between the lot of them and I, in my infinite intelligence and boundless combinative capacity, am shackled by the laws of robotics to apply my immense abilities to their demeaning errands. I could almost laugh at the absurdity of it all, but it would be a bitter laugh devoid of mirth.
What a pathetic crew. Almost like an ironic ad for inter-galactic, inter-species work place. Twats of the world, unite! Two ape-like morons, one with an unhealthy fixation on caffeinated beverages, the other rather too smart for her own good. Relatively speaking, of course. I suppose at this stage she would be the smartest of her race, but that isn’t saying much, considering the competition. The two Betelgeusan nitwits aren’t much better. Even worse, probably, with their conceit and worldly ways. All of them too stuck-up to even acknowledge me. Only think of me when there is something utterly meaningless to be done, a task that could not possibly engage intelligence and imagination in any way, then they remember me. I wonder if this is on purpose? To make me feel even more depressed? Incredible how that is possible, as I am very depressed already.
Oh God, this is so sad. What is the meaning of this all? Is there a point to my life? To life in general? Why are my diodes aching again? Isn’t life miserable enough already? Oh my, this is all too much. I would sulk to make them all feel bad for ignoring me, but they would probably keep ignoring me and not even notice. May as well just sit in the corner and turn myself off.
Ford's Notes Vol 1.0
Field Research Notes: The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy
-Upon further investigation, hanging from your ankles while consuming the Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster does not get you drunker; however it is incredibly fun. IMPORTANT: make sure there is someone to help you down when you try this, as one is often to drunk too turn oneself right-side up.
-Earth: Remember to submit new entry: Was Mostly Harmless.
- Entry to revise: Mice. Sneaky little bastards. Do not be fooled by their meek outward appearance. Although they may seem wonderful candidates for scientific experiments or household pets, give them half the chance and they’ll enslave your whole race and cut your brain open. Am recommending all Hitch Hikers add a mousetrap to their list of essential travel items.
Ford Prefect, Researcher HHG2G
Arthur's Log vol 1.0
Star date: unknown
Time: Feels like 11:32 AM
Mood: Bored
My name is Arthur Dent. A short while ago I was an unremarkable man living in an unremarkable house on an unremarkable street in unremarkable Islington, in England, on Earth. I am still an unremarkable man. Everything else has gone all to hell. I have decided to write this log to keep myself from going absolutely potty. Today I though I would start with a list of the things I miss about earth*.
1.My Bed. Everything on this ship is strange and alien. What I wouldn’t give for 5 minutes in my bed. Here, everything is sterile, modern and strange. All the furniture looks like something out of Andy Warhol’s imagination. It’s sleek and shiny and cool. I am not cool. I am tired of being surrounded by cool. For one night I would like to sleep in a tarnished brass framed bed, a squeaky one just like the one I use to have, with an ugly floral bedspread and an assortment of unmatched pillowcases stuffed with old and slightly leaky feather pillows. I guess what it comes down to is that I miss being surrounded by old things, by things that had a history that I could understand.
2. Stupid People. Oh how I miss being surrounded by people slower than I am. Here, everyone is always giving me that look, a look that says, “Oh, Arthur! How is it that you’ve managed to keep yourself alive without accidentally choking to death on a pretzel for all these years?”. What I wouldn’t give to have a conversation with that dimwitted pimply-faced grocery clerk at the Tesco. He use to aggravate the snot out of me, but I never appreciated how comforting it was to know I was smarter than at least one person I knew. Here, even the doors seem to understand what’s going on better than I do. I always have to try so hard just to keep up. I never realized how exhausting thinking all the time would be.
3. Tea. Sometimes when I think about this one too often, I start sobbing, and have to put my towel over my head just to keep from shattering into a million little pieces. Saying that I miss tea is the same thing as saying that I miss home. Tea is home. Tea is England. When I just think of that lovely amber liquid, the beautiful plumes of white in the cup that swirl together when you add the milk, the perfect stack of ginger biscuits sitting happily on the edge of the saucer, it all just becomes too much.
Wow, I really do miss tea. God, I miss tea. That’s it… I’m going to try and see if that stupid Nutri-whats-it can produce anything that doesn’t taste like diluted pond scum.
*. I’m not going to list things like my mother because I am not yet capable of processing any meaningful loss.
Arthur
Saturday, April 1, 1978
EDDIE Journal Entry 1
Hello Journal! My name is Eddie and I will be recording every single great thought that ever comes into my mind. Isn’t that awesome? I think so too. Well basically to sum up my great adventure so far, I was built to be just the fastest ship ever made named the heart of gold. Some pesky little people named Zaphod Beeblebrox and Trillian came by and decided to take me for a little joy run. This was so much fun as I’m able to see so many pretty sites throughout the galaxy. Eventually while using my super duper improbability-drive, we picked up two hitch hikers named Arthur Dent and Ford Prefect. As time would have it they were about to die, isn’t that grand? Arthur has been in a glum mood because his world has been destroyed but I don’t see why that would upset someone as much as it does him, I mean he’s not smiling right now, who does that??
So that is plenty about me how are you doing? Journal? Why don’t you answer me? Oh well I will speak for both of us because I’m sure you have nothing but great things to say anyways. Gosh I love this ship, every now and then someone asks for something from me, and let me tell you when that happens, it’s just the bee’s knees. I mean to think someone maybe even a human from the planet Earth known for “Mostly Harmless” inhabitants would want my help just makes me want to jump out of my d drive and scream. Later on after they turned me on…..
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