I came upon hhgttg in much the same way I came upon all things from the UK. In my youth my mother and I lived in a valley. That valley had little to no TV reception. Only two channels were watchable. One was channel 9 (WWOR for those in the NYC metro), and I was mostly not allowed to watch that outside my mother's presence due to it's content. So I had public television. And in the late hours when my mother was out working 3rd shift somewhere (after working 1st and 2nd in other places for sure), I would be treated to the finest out of date entertainment the BBC saw fit to give away. Monty Python, Faulty Towers and Dr. Who were my most steady friends. For a very brief window, they aired the Hitchhiker's TV series. But it was gone long before concluding the story. My mother, seeing how disappointed I was hunted and found the books. And a lifetime love was born.
I have been in love with the mind of Douglas Adams for as long as I can recall. From his typewriter (as he had stated his loathing of pens as instruments of serious writing) sprung gems that have both entertained my mind and educated me more than most serious tomes could ever hope to. From Mr. Adams I learned about human nature. He gave us the SEP Field (Somebody Else's Problem). You see scientists had found that when you surround anything with a force that gives an onlooker the impression that it is somebody else's problem they don't see it at all. I also learned about the questionably fruitful nature of human (and non-human) endeavors. In the first book pan-dimensional beings build a grand computer to calculate the secret (a question) to "life, the universe and everything" only to have it demolished to make way for a new hyper-space bypass moments before it would come to it's conclusions in an oversight of bureaucracy.
All this sets the stage for my mother's 18th birthday present to me. A leather-bound edition of the 4 book long "trilogy" of hhgttg called "The More Than Complete Hitchhiker's Guide". I had already read all the books (though it contained a never before published short story I g
obbled up before my party was through). The book came with me to Fordham and was there the day the 20 year old bull dyke, a friend of mine, came to me and said she was going downtown to have her new 5th book in the "trilogy" autographed (he always called it a trilogy regardless of the number of books he wrote - the 5th was the last). Now, I'm not one for autographs and hero-worship. However stories of Mr. Adams in person were the stuff of legend. He was just as cantankerous and obnoxious as one could imagine for a mind that birthed these books. So I decided I should see this for myself.As if Mr. Adams had been briefed for what we were expecting, the spectacle of the day could not have been better. It was a particularly warm November day. The line to get into the B. Dalton's bookstore on West 8th was around the block. Being dressed for the cold and getting the hot we were all sweating in the sun and carrying heavy loads of discarded coats and gloves and such. So when I finally reached the doors of the store and entered I was very relieved to be immediately distracted from my misery by the play taking place before us all. The first thing I saw was a very irate man in a white shirt, little bow tie and glasses, wearing a B.Dalton's name tag. He was quietly but insistently pointing at something I could not see and trying to get past another man who was impeding him. "He can't do that in here. It's simply not allowed!" he whined. The man in his way was in a black blazer and looked less than entertained. Strangely, from his bearing, I could just tell he'd been through this before. "He's almost through. It's silly to stop it now." he said. Moments after hearing the the crowd parted just enough for me to see Douglas sitting at the table signing a book with a lit cigarette hanging out of his mouth. Now being able to see him I could finally make out what he'd been muttering the whole time as he signed, "If he wants me to step outside to fucking smoke, I'll step outside and give the fucking books away instead of letting people buy them. I don't give a shit..." He continued in this way the whole time the little man from the store was standing there. I, and everyone around me, laughed as mutedly as we could for fear of being kicked out before getting our turn.
When I did make it up to the table, I handed over my leather-bound edition without a word. I had no idea what to say.
I had it open to chapter 29 of "So Long And Thanks For All The Fish", which is the fourth book. Chapter 29 is interesting for being only one paragraph long. It is a flight announcement. If I had any idea how much I would end up hearing these in my life to come I may not have made that choice. But being so short it provided quite a bit of blank space on the page and struck me as a good place for the book to be signed. The book was signed in a flash and then he slammed it shut - a bit hard for my tastes. But then he saw the cover and looked surprised. "What the bloody hell is this?" he asked aloud. The man in the black blazer, his manager I had surmised, turned instantly and said "Don't worry Doug, you got paid on it." "Oh, OK." Douglas answered calmly and then looked at the book more gently. "The More Than Complete," he read aloud. "Well that's not true now is it?" With that he opened to the title page and c
rossed out the word "more" to replace it with "less". I was stunned. Everyone around me glared. I'm sure they were very unhappy they hadn't thought to bring their own.I adored that book. Too much, in fact. I was obsessed for a long time with it's care. The the universe interceded and it was lost from our move to our last home. I was devastated for along time. I searched everywhere I could. After a few years, I gave up. Then, long after I thought it was gone for good, my wife found it when unpacking from our recent move into our new home in a box that had been in the garage and never opened form the apartment. I'm very happy to have it back. I intend to be more careful to apply the lessons I learned from the stories on its pages this time and not hold it too dear. I also hope to get another generation hooked. Bu that will have to wait a few years. After all, I don't intend to explain to an 8 year old why it's so funny that there is a male character who is said to have at least two known heads above his shoulders and an unknown number below. That is something left behind the SEP field for at least half a dozen more years.
Good luck, and always make sure you know where your towel is.
