On Tue, 02 Oct 2007 10:47:36 +0100, Bill Pragnell wrote:

> Jim Henderson wrote:
>> But the sorts of questions Steve and I would ask each other would have
>> considered "what was the improbability factor that Ford and Arthur were
>> rescued by the Heart of Gold at?" to be a simple questions. (2^267709:1
>> against - possibly much higher)
> Hmm, I couldn't have answered that, but I suppose if you know the
> Islington area code you're halfway there ;-)
> 
>> More along the lines of:
>> 
>> How many times had Lintilla been cloned?
> Millions, as I recall, and, typically for Adams, a terribly specific
> number.

578 thousand million times. :-)

> 
>> What was the ratio of Lintilla clones to lonely business executives
>> that was maintained to keep the laws of supply and demand in balance?
> Crikey, this merely rings a bell.

It's a bit of a trick question - the cloning machine was making 6 copies 
of Lintilla for a Brantasvogon escort agency while another was making 500 
lonely business executives to keep the laws of supply and demand working 
profitably.  The ratio, therefore, is 6:500. :-)  The "trick" is that 
most would think of the much larger number (578 thousand million)

>> Which escape capsule did Ford and Arthur get into in the Hagunnenon
>> ship?
> Ah, a fifty-fifty. Very generous! Um, left? My imagination says right
> and for some reason my imagination always gets left and right wrong.

They got into the right-hand one.  Ford tells Zaphod "You and the others 
take the left-hand one". :-)

>> In the end of the first episode, there's a chord played played after
>> Prostetnic Vogon Jeltz issues his ultimatum to Ford and Arthur.  What
>> is the piece of music that chord comes from, and who was the composer?
> I thought it was a radiophonic effect. Sounds like an organ, so I'll say
> Bach.

Nope, far, far too dissonant for Bach.  Its Lontano, from A Modern Mass 
for the Dead by Ligeti.

>>> "How did you nutters get in here?"
>>> "Well, what it is, you see, is, well, we flew in. Yes, definitely, we
>>> flew in."
>>> "Well, bloody fly out again."
>> 
>> Listened to that bit on the drive in this morning.  Fit the Twelfth
>> finished just as I pulled into my parking spot.
> 
> :D

I always like when that happens, and it happens more often than it seems 
it should by chance.

>> There is a benefit to a 45-minute+ drive in the morning. :-)
> I currently walk to work, but if I ever face a commute this will be my
> strategy also.
> 
>> "VarNtvar...."
>> "Varntvar.  He's a priest.  Does marriages, and other things, but
>> mostly marriages."
> 
> :D
> 
> "I have worked out that if I stick my left hand into my right ear I can
> electrocute myself."
> "What?"
> "Terminally."
> "Is that so."
> "I can do it at a moment's notice. Just give the word." "Just cool it,
> Marvin."
> ...
> "I think I'll go and hide."

"Pausing only to reconstruct the whole infrastructure of integral 
mathematics in his head, he went about his humble task, never thinking to 
ask for reward, recognition or even a moment's ease from the terrible 
pain in all the diodes down his left side.   Fetch Beeblebrox they say, 
and forth he goes..."

> PS we seem to have hijacked this thread in a direction nobody could have
> predicted

It would seem so. :-)

Jim

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