douglas-adams

I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended
up where I needed to be.
Douglas Adams, The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul
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I love deadlines. I love the whooshing noise they make as they go by.
Douglas Adams, The Salmon of Doubt
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The story so far:
In the beginning the Universe was created.
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move.
Douglas Adams, The Restaurant at the End of the Universe
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I refuse to answer that question on the grounds that I don't know the answer
Douglas Adams
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For instance, on the planet Earth, man had always assumed that he was
more intelligent than dolphins because he had achieved so much - the
wheel, New York, wars and so on, whilst all the dolphins had ever done
was muck about in the water having a good time. But conversely, the
dolphins had always believed that they were far more intelligent than
man for precisely the same reasons.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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There is a theory which states that if ever anyone 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, The Restaurant at the End of the Universe
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The fact that we live at the bottom of a deep gravity well, on the
surface of a gas covered planet going around a nuclear fireball 90
million miles away and think this to be normal is obviously some
indication of how skewed our perspective tends to be.
Douglas Adams, The Salmon of Doubt: Hitchhiking the Galaxy One Last Time
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"The Guide says there is an art to flying", said Ford, "or rather a
knack. The knack lies in learning how to throw yourself at the ground
and miss."
Douglas Adams, Life, the Universe and Everything
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Don't Panic.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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A learning experience is one of those things that says, 'You know that
thing you just did? Don't do that."
Douglas Adams, The Salmon of Doubt
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A common mistake that people make when trying to design something
completely foolproof is to underestimate the ingenuity of complete
fools.
Douglas Adams, Mostly Harmless
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Would it save you a lot of time if I just gave up and went mad now?
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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Time is an illusion. Lunchtime doubly so.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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The ships hung in the sky in much the same way that bricks don't.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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The major problemoneof the major problems, for there are severalone of
the many major problems with governing people is that of whom you get
to do it; or rather of who manages to get people to let them do it to
them.
To summarize: it is a well-known fact that those people who mustwantto
rule people are, ipso facto, those least suited to do it.
To summarize the summary: anyone who is capable of getting themselves
made President should on no account be allowed to do the job.
Douglas Adams, The Restaurant at the End of the Universe
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Nothing travels faster than the speed of light, with the possible
exception of bad news, which obeys its own special laws.
Douglas Adams, Mostly Harmless
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Isn't it enough to see that a garden is beautiful without having to
believe that there are fairies at the bottom of it too?
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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He felt that his whole life was some kind of dream and he sometimes
wondered whose it was and whether they were enjoying it.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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Space is big. You just won't believe how vastly, hugely,
mind-bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it's a long way down
the road to the chemist's, but that's just peanuts to space.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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You live and learn. At any rate, you live.
Douglas Adams, Mostly Harmless
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If there's anything more important than my ego around, I want it
caught and shot now.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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Let's think the unthinkable, let's do the undoable. Let us prepare to
grapple with the ineffable itself, and see if we may not eff it after
all.
Douglas Adams, Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency
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I'd far rather be happy than right any day.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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It is known that there are an infinite number of worlds, simply
because there is an infinite amount of space for them to be
in. However, not every one of them is inhabited. Therefore, there must
be a finite number of inhabited worlds. Any finite number divided by
infinity is as near to nothing as makes no odds, so the average
population of all the planets in the Universe can be said to be
zero. From this it follows that the population of the whole Universe
is also zero, and that any people you may meet from time to time are
merely the products of a deranged imagination.
Douglas Adams, The Restaurant at the End of the Universe
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'This must be Thursday,' said Arthur to himself, sinking low over his
beer. 'I never could get the hang of Thursdays.'
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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You know," said Arthur, "it's at times like this, when I'm trapped in
a Vogon airlock with a man from Betelgeuse, and about to die of
asphyxiation in deep space that I really wish I'd listened to what my
mother told me when I was young."
"Why, what did she tell you?"
"I don't know, I didn't listen."
Douglas Adams, The Ultimate Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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Ford... you're turning into a penguin. Stop it.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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I'd take the awe of understanding over the awe of ignorance any day.
Douglas Adams, The Salmon of Doubt
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"So this is it," said Arthur, "We are going to die."
"Yes," said Ford, "except... no! Wait a minute!" He suddenly lunged across the chamber at something behind Arthur's line of vision. "What's this switch?" he cried.
"What? Where?" cried Arthur, twisting round.
"No, I was only fooling," said Ford, "we are going to die after all.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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Reality is frequently inaccurate.
Douglas Adams, The Restaurant at the End of the Universe
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A towel, [The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy] 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-boggingly 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.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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If you try and take a cat apart to see how it works, the first thing
you have on your hands is a non-working cat.
Douglas Adams
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There are some people you like immediately, some whom you think you
might learn to like in the fullness of time, and some that you simply
want to push away from you with a sharp stick.
Douglas Adams, The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul
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O Deep Thought computer," he said, "the task we have designed you to perform is this. We want you to tell us...." he paused, "The Answer."
"The Answer?" said Deep Thought. "The Answer to what?"
"Life!" urged Fook.
"The Universe!" said Lunkwill.
"Everything!" they said in chorus.
Deep Thought paused for a moment's reflection.
"Tricky," he said finally.
"But can you do it?"
Again, a significant pause.
"Yes," said Deep Thought, "I can do it."
"There is an answer?" said Fook with breathless excitement.
"Yes," said Deep Thought. "Life, the Universe, and Everything. There is an answer. But, I'll have to think about it."
...
Fook glanced impatiently at his watch.
How long? he said.
Seven and a half million years, said Deep Thought.
Lunkwill and Fook blinked at each other.
Seven and a half million years...! they cried in chorus.
Yes, declaimed Deep Thought, I said Id have to think about it, didnt I?"

[Seven and a half million years later.... Fook and Lunkwill are long gone, but their ancestors continue what they started]

"We are the ones who will hear," said Phouchg, "the answer to the great question of Life....!"
"The Universe...!" said Loonquawl.
"And Everything...!"
"Shhh," said Loonquawl with a slight gesture. "I think Deep Thought is preparing to speak!"
There was a moment's expectant pause while panels slowly came to life on the front of the console. Lights flashed on and off experimentally and settled down into a businesslike pattern. A soft low hum came from the communication channel.

"Good Morning," said Deep Thought at last.
"Er..good morning, O Deep Thought" said Loonquawl nervously, "do you have...er, that is..."
"An Answer for you?" interrupted Deep Thought majestically. "Yes, I have."
The two men shivered with expectancy. Their waiting had not been in vain.
"There really is one?" breathed Phouchg.
"There really is one," confirmed Deep Thought.
"To Everything? To the great Question of Life, the Universe and everything?"
"Yes."
Both of the men had been trained for this moment, their lives had been a preparation for it, they had been selected at birth as those who would witness the answer, but even so they found themselves gasping and squirming like excited children.
"And you're ready to give it to us?" urged Loonsuawl.
"I am."
"Now?"
"Now," said Deep Thought.
They both licked their dry lips.
"Though I don't think," added Deep Thought. "that you're going to like it."
"Doesn't matter!" said Phouchg. "We must know it! Now!"
"Now?" inquired Deep Thought.
"Yes! Now..."
"All right," said the computer, and settled into silence again. The two men fidgeted. The tension was unbearable.
"You're really not going to like it," observed Deep Thought.
"Tell us!"
"All right," said Deep Thought. "The Answer to the Great Question..."
"Yes..!"
"Of Life, the Universe and Everything..." said Deep Thought.
"Yes...!"
"Is..." said Deep Thought, and paused.
"Yes...!"
"Is..."
"Yes...!!!...?"
"Forty-two," said Deep Thought, with infinite majesty and calm.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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I've come up with a set of rules that describe our reactions to technologies:
1. Anything that is in the world when youre born is normal and ordinary and is just a natural part of the way the world works.
2. Anything that's invented between when youre fifteen and thirty-five is new and exciting and revolutionary and you can probably get a career in it.
3. Anything invented after you're thirty-five is against the natural order of things.
Douglas Adams, The Salmon of Doubt
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What to do if you find yourself stuck in a crack in the ground underneath a giant boulder you can't move, with no hope of rescue.  Consider how lucky you are that life has been good to you so far. Alternatively, if life hasn't been good to you so far, which given your current circumstances seems more likely, consider how lucky you are that it won't be troubling you much longer.
Douglas Adams, The Original Hitchhiker Radio Scripts
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It is a mistake to think you can solve any major problems just with potatoes.
Douglas Adams, Life, the Universe and Everything
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The Answer to the Great Question... Of Life, the Universe and Everything... Is... Forty-two,' said Deep Thought, with infinite majesty and calm.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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Now it is such a bizarrely improbable coincidence that anything so mind-bogglingly useful could have evolved purely by chance that some thinkers have chosen to see it as the final and clinching proof of the non-existence of God.
The argument goes something like this: "I refuse to prove that I exist,'" says God, "for proof denies faith, and without faith I am nothing."
"But," says Man, "The Babel fish is a dead giveaway, isn't it? It could not have evolved by chance. It proves you exist, and so therefore, by your own arguments, you don't. QED."
"Oh dear," says God, "I hadn't thought of that," and promptly vanishes in a puff of logic.
"Oh, that was easy," says Man, and for an encore goes on to prove that black is white and gets himself killed on the next zebra crossing.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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He attacked everything in life with a mix of extraordinary genius and naive incompetence, and it was often difficult to tell which was which.
Douglas Adams
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For a moment, nothing happened. Then, after a second or so, nothing continued to happen.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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If I ever meet myself,' said Zaphod, 'I'll hit myself so hard I won't know what's hit me.
Douglas Adams, The Restaurant at the End of the Universe
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This planet has - or rather had - a problem, which was this: most of the people living on it were unhappy for pretty much of the time. Many solutions were suggested for this problem, but most of these were largely concerned with the movement of small green pieces of paper, which was odd because on the whole it wasn't the small green pieces of paper that were unhappy.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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He hoped and prayed that there wasn't an afterlife.  Then he realized there was a contradiction involved here and merely hoped that there wasn't an afterlife.
Douglas Adams, Life, the Universe and Everything
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One of the things Ford Prefect had always found hardest to understand about humans was their habit of continually stating and repeating the very very obvious.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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So long, and thanks for all the fish.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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It can hardly be a coincidence that no language on earth has ever produced the expression, 'As pretty as an airport.
Douglas Adams, The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul
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We are stuck with technology when what we really want is just stuff that works.
Douglas Adams, The Salmon of Doubt
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Technology is a word that describes something that doesn't work yet.
Douglas Adams
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Don't you understand that we need to be childish in order to understand?  Only a child sees things with perfect clarity, because it hasn't developed all those filters which prevent us from seeing things that we don't expect to see.
Douglas Adams, Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency
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Beethoven tells you what it's like to be Beethoven and Mozart tells you what it's like to be human. Bach tells you what it's like to be the universe.
Douglas Adams
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All you really need to know for the moment is that the universe is a lot more complicated than you might think, even if you start from a position of thinking it's pretty damn complicated in the first place.
Douglas Adams
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We can't win against obsession.  They care, we don't.  They win.
Douglas Adams, Life, the Universe and Everything
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Just believe everything I tell you, and it will all be very, very simple.'

Ah, well, I'm not sure I believe that.
Douglas Adams, Life, the Universe and Everything
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Don't believe anything you read on the net. Except this. Well, including this, I suppose.
Douglas Adams
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God's Final Message to His Creation:
'We apologize for the inconvenience.
Douglas Adams, So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish
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All opinions are not equal. Some are a very great deal more robust, sophisticated and well supported in logic and argument than others.
Douglas Adams, The Salmon of Doubt
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First we thought the PC was a calculator. Then we found out how to turn numbers into letters with ASCII  and we thought it was a typewriter. Then we discovered graphics, and we thought it was a television. With the World Wide Web, we've realized it's a brochure.
Douglas Adams
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My doctor says that I have a malformed public-duty gland and a natural deficiency in moral fibre and that I am therefore excused from saving universes.
Douglas Adams
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Did I do anything wrong today," he said, "or has the world always been like this and I've been too wrapped up in myself to notice?
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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There is no point in using the word 'impossible' to describe something that has clearly happened.
Douglas Adams, Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency
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Far out in the uncharted backwaters of the unfashionable end of the western spiral arm of the Galaxy lies a small unregarded yellow sun. Orbiting this at a distance of roughly ninety-two million miles is an utterly insignificant little blue green planet whose ape-descended life forms are so amazingly primitive that they still think digital watches are a pretty neat idea.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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Arthur: If I asked you where the hell we were, would I regret it?
Ford: We're safe.
Arthur: Oh good.
Ford: We're in a small galley cabin in one of the spaceships of the Vogon Constructor Fleet.
Arthur: Ah, this is obviously some strange use of the wordsafethat I wasn't previously aware of.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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A cup of tea would restore my normality.
Douglas Adams
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We demand rigidly defined areas of doubt and uncertainty!
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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But the plans were on display...
On display? I eventually had to go down to the cellar to find them.
Thats the display department.
With a flashlight.
Ah, well, the lights had probably gone.
So had the stairs.
But look, you found the notice, didnt you?
Yes, said Arthur, yes I did. It was on display in the bottom of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying Beware of the Leopard.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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Ford!" he said, "there's an infinite number of monkeys outside who want to talk to us about this script forHamletthey've worked out.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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There's always a moment when you start to fall out of love, whether it's with a person or an idea or a cause, even if it's one you only narrate to yourself years after the event: a tiny thing, a wrong word, a false note, which means that things can never be quite the same again.
Douglas Adams, The Salmon of Doubt
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Anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no account be allowed to do the job.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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Capital Letters Were Always The Best Way Of Dealing With Things You Didn't Have A Good Answer To.
Douglas Adams
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All through my life I've had this strange unaccountable feeling that something was going on in the world, something big, even sinister, and no one would tell me what it was."
"No," said the old man, "that's just perfectly normal paranoia.  Everyone in the Universe has that.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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Human beings, who are almost unique in having the ability to learn from the experience of others, are also remarkable for their apparent disinclination to do so.
Douglas Adams, Last Chance to See
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If it looks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, we have at least to consider the possibility that we have a small aquatic bird of the family anatidae on our hands.
Douglas Adams
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I think you ought to know I'm feeling very depressed.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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The impossible often has a kind of integrity to it which the merely improbable lacks.
Douglas Adams, The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul
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Life is wasted on the living.
Douglas Adams, The Restaurant at the End of the Universe
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I think fish is nice, but then I think that rain is wet, so who am I to judge?
Douglas Adams
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In those days spirits were brave, the stakes were high, men were real men, women were real women and small furry creatures from Alpha Centauri were real small furry creatures from Alpha Centauri.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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It can be very dangerous to see things from somebody else's point of view without the proper training.
Douglas Adams, The Ultimate Hitchhiker's Guide: Five Complete Novels and One Story
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The Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy also mentions alcohol. It says that the best drink in existence is the Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster, the effect of which is like having your brains smashed out with a slice of lemon wrapped round a large gold brick.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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My universe is my eyes and my ears. Anything else is hearsay.
Douglas Adams, The Restaurant at the End of the Universe
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Life, said Marvin dolefully, loathe it or ignore it, you cant like it.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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What's so unpleasant about being drunk?"
"Ask a glass of water!
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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Arthur Dent: What happens if I press this button?
Ford Prefect: I wouldn't-
Arthur Dent: Oh.
Ford Prefect: What happened?
Arthur Dent: A sign lit up, saying 'Please do not press this button again.
Douglas Adams, The Original Hitchhiker Radio Scripts
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My favourite piece of information is that Branwell Bronte, brother of Emily and Charlotte, died standing up leaning against a mantle piece, in order to prove it could be done.

This is not quite true, in fact. My absolute favourite piece of information is the fact that young sloths are so inept that they frequently grab their own arms and legs instead of tree limbs, and fall out of trees.

However, this is not relevant to what is currently on my mind because it concerns sloths, whereas the Branwell Bronte piece of information concerns writers and feeling like death and doing things to prove they can be done, all of which are pertinent to my current situation to a degree that is, frankly, spooky.
Douglas Adams, The Salmon of Doubt
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42 is a nice number that you can take home and introduce to your family.
Douglas Adams
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Now, the invention of the scientific method and science is, I'm sure we'll all agree, the most powerful intellectual idea, the most powerful framework for thinking and investigating and understanding and challenging the world around us that there is, and that it rests on the premise that any idea is there to be attacked and if it withstands the attack then it lives to fight another day and if it doesn't withstand the attack then down it goes. Religion doesn't seem to work like that; it has certain ideas at the heart of it which we call sacred or holy or whatever. That's an idea we're so familiar with, whether we subscribe to it or not, that it's kind of odd to think what it actually means, because really what it means is 'Here is an idea or a notion that you're not allowed to say anything bad about; you're just not. Why not? - because you're not!
Douglas Adams
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Curiously enough, the only thing that went through the mind of the bowl of petunias as it fell was Oh no, not again. Many people have speculated that if we knew exactly why the bowl of petunias had thought that we would know a lot more about the nature of the Universe than we do now.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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Life... is like a grapefruit. Well, it's sort of orangey-yellow and dimpled on the outside, wet and squidgy in the middle. It's got pips inside, too. Oh, and some people have half a one for breakfast.
Douglas Adams, So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish
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This is rather as if you imagine a puddle waking up one morning and thinking, 'This is an interesting world I find myself in  an interesting hole I find myself in  fits me rather neatly, doesn't it? In fact it fits me staggeringly well, must have been made to have me in it!' This is such a powerful idea that as the sun rises in the sky and the air heats up and as, gradually, the puddle gets smaller and smaller, frantically hanging on to the notion that everything's going to be alright, because this world was meant to have him in it, was built to have him in it; so the moment he disappears catches him rather by surprise. I think this may be something we need to be on the watch out for.
Douglas Adams, The Salmon of Doubt
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What I need... is a strong drink and a peer group.
Douglas Adams, Life, the Universe and Everything
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To summarize the summary of the summary: people are a problem.
Douglas Adams, The Restaurant at the End of the Universe
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For Children: You will need to know the difference between Friday and a fried egg. It's quite a simple difference, but an important one. Friday comes at the end of the week, whereas a fried egg comes out of a chicken. Like most things, of course, it isn't quite that simple. The fried egg isn't properly a fried egg until it's been put in a frying pan and fried. This is something you wouldn't do to a Friday, of course, though you might do it on a Friday. You can also fry eggs on a Thursday, if you like, or on a cooker. It's all rather complicated, but it makes a kind of sense if you think about it for a while.
Douglas Adams, The Salmon of Doubt
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The quality of any advice anybody has to offer has to be judged against the quality of life they actually lead.
Douglas Adams, The Ultimate Hitchhiker's Guide: Five Complete Novels and One Story
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A life that is burdened with expectations is a heavy life. Its fruit is sorrow and disappointment.
Douglas Adams, The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul
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Arthur blinked at the screens and felt he was missing something important. Suddenly he realized what it was.

"Is there any tea on this spaceship?" he asked.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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Bypasses are devices that allow some people to dash from point A to point B very fast while other people dash from point B to point A very fast. People living at point C, being a point directly in between, are often given to wonder what's so great about point A that so many people from point B are so keen to get there, and what's so great about point B that so many people from point A are so keen to get there. They often wish that people would just once and for all work out where the hell they wanted to be.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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and then I decided I was a lemon for a couple of weeks.
Douglas Adams, Life, the Universe and Everything
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Meanwhile, the poor Babel fish, by effectively removing all barriers to communication between different races and cultures, has caused more and bloodier wars than anything else in the history of creation.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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Ahenny (adj.) - The way people stand when examining other people's bookshelves.
Douglas Adams, The Deeper Meaning of Liff
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Humans are not proud of their ancestors, and rarely invite them round to dinner.
Douglas Adams
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Exactly!" said Deep Thought. "So once you do know what the question actually is, you'll know what the answer means.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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The bird that would soar above the plain of tradition and prejudice must have strong wings. 
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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See first, think later, then test. But always see first. Otherwise you will only see what you were expecting. Most scientists forget that.
Douglas Adams
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And then, one Thursday, nearly two thousand years after one man had been nailed to a tree for saying how great it would be to be nice to people for a change, a girl sitting on her own in a small cafe in Rickmansworth suddenly realized what it was that had been going wrong all this time, and she finally knew how the world could be made a good and happy place. This time it was right, it would work, and no one would have to get nailed to anything.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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Perhaps I'm old and tired, but I always think that the chances of finding out what really is going on are so absurdly remote that the only thing to do is to say hang the sense of it and just keep yourself occupied.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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Ow! My brains!
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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Words used carelessly, as if they did not matter in any serious way, often allowed otherwise well-guarded truths to seep through.
Douglas Adams, The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul
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The last ever dolphin message was misinterpreted as a surprisingly sophisticated attempt to do a double-backwards-somersault through a hoop whilst whistling the 'Star Spangled Banner', but in fact the message was this:So long and thanks for all the fish.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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One is never alone with a rubber duck.
Douglas Adams
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He was a dreamer, a thinker, a speculative philosopher... or, as his wife would have it, an idiot.
Douglas Adams
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Can't stand all these poisonous creatures, all these snakes and insects and fish and things. Wretched things, biting everybody. And then people expect me to tell them what to do about it. I'll tell them what to do. Don't get bitten in the first place. (quoting Dr. Struan Sutherland)
Douglas Adams
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The History of every major Galactic Civilization tends to pass through three distinct and recognizable phases, those of Survival, Inquiry and Sophistication, otherwise known as the How, Why, and Where phases.  For instance, the first phase is characterized by the question 'How can we eat?' the second by the question 'Why do we eat?' and the third by the question 'Where shall we have lunch?
Douglas Adams, The Restaurant at the End of the Universe
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Another thing that got forgotten was the fact that against all probability a sperm whale had suddenly been called into existence several miles above the surface of an alien planet.

And since this is not a naturally tenable position for a whale, this poor innocent creature had very little time to come to terms with its identity as a whale before it then had to come to terms with not being a whale any more.

This is a complete record of its thoughts from the moment it began its life till the moment it ended it.

Ah ... ! Whats happening? it thought.

Er, excuse me, who am I?

Hello?

Why am I here? Whats my purpose in life?

What do I mean by who am I?

Calm down, get a grip now ... oh! this is an interesting sensation, what is it? Its a sort of ... yawning, tingling sensation in my ... my ... well I suppose Id better start finding names for things if I want to make any headway in what for the sake of what I shall call an argument I shall call the world, so lets call it my stomach.

Good. Ooooh, its getting quite strong. And hey, whats about this whistling roaring sound going past what Im suddenly going to call my head? Perhaps I can call that ... wind! Is that a good name? Itll do ... perhaps I can find a better name for it later when Ive found out what its for. It must be something very important because there certainly seems to be a hell of a lot of it. Hey! Whats this thing? This ... lets call it a tail  yeah, tail. Hey! I can can really thrash it about pretty good cant I? Wow! Wow! That feels great! Doesnt seem to achieve very much but Ill probably find out what its for later on. Now  have I built up any coherent picture of things yet?

No.

Never mind, hey, this is really exciting, so much to find out about, so much to look forward to, Im quite dizzy with anticipation ...

Or is it the wind?

There really is a lot of that now isnt it?

And wow! Hey! Whats this thing suddenly coming towards me very fast? Very very fast. So big and flat and round, it needs a big wide sounding name like ... ow ... ound ... round ... ground! Thats it! Thats a good name  ground!

I wonder if it will be friends with me?

And the rest, after a sudden wet thud, was silence.

Curiously enough, the only thing that went through the mind of the bowl of petunias as it fell was Oh no, not again. Many people have speculated that if we knew exactly why the bowl of petunias had thought that we would know a lot more about the nature of the universe than we do now.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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and well be saying a big hello to all intelligent life forms everywhere ... and to everyone else out there, the secret is to bang the rocks together, guys.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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Well, I mean, yes idealism, yes the dignity of pure research, yes the pursuit of truth in all its forms, but there comes a point I'm afraid where you begin to suspect that the entire multidimensional infinity of the Universe is almost certainly being run by a bunch of maniacs. And if it comes to a choice between spending yet another ten million years finding that out, and on the other hand just taking the money and running, then I for one could do with the exercise.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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The point is, you see," said Ford, "that there is no point in driving yourself mad trying to stop yourself going mad. You might just as well give in and save your sanity for later.
Douglas Adams, Life, the Universe and Everything
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One of the major difficulties Trillian experienced in her relationship with Zaphood was learning to distinguish between him pretending to be stupid just to get people off their guard, pretending to be stupid because he couldn't be bothered to think and wanted someone else to do it for him, pretending to be outrageously stupid to hide the fact that he actually didnt understand what was going on, and really being genuinely stupid. He was renowned for being amazingly clever and quite clearly was sobut not all the time, which obviously worried him, hence, the act. He preferred people to be puzzled rather than contemptuous.
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
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Anything that happens, happens.

Anything that, in happening, causes something else to happen, causes something else to happen.

Anything that, in happening, causes itself to happen again, happens again.

It doesnt necessarily do it in chronological order, though.
Douglas Adams, Mostly Harmless
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We notice things that don't work. We don't notice things that do. We notice computers, we don't notice pennies. We notice e-book readers, we don't notice books.
Douglas Adams, The Salmon of Doubt
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