HHG

Hitchhiker's Guide (to the galaxy)

Other acronyms include HHGG and H2G2. It is generaly unclear if the 'G' in HHG is meant to refer to Guide or Galaxy, but Guide seems to make more sense.

ahem

This page exists because Nemo is a fan.

For the moment, it's just a list of some links he might want to chase up, and a few random ideas... :)

Items from within the story

Things a HHG fan might concievably buy if it was marketed, or make for themself.

• Dressing gown (perhaps matching towel designs - see below)
• Wikkit Gate and Ultimate Weapon matching set (perhaps at 42% scale) (see: wikipedia:Wicket)
• Kill-O-Zap gun (see also below - Fifth Element)
• The ? Institute's Prize for Extreme Cleverness (as won by the inventor of the Infinite Improbability Drive)
• Slartibartfast Design Award (block of perspex with Norway in it)

Items inspired from the story

• Towels

Towels with enhancements

Towel gets it's own sub-category since it is so iconic to the culture. All towel enhancement ideas should be functional (imho) without detracting from the essential towel concept. ie, You can dry yourself off with it if it seems clean enough

• Hand-holds with double stitching and reinforced hems (possibly not towel-stuff hems. (seatbelt like stuff and with eyelets in corners (like a tarp) ?
• Pockets
• Wearable as shawl (but not poncho, as I feel the required hole defeats the essential towelness)
• Wearable as a Tunic/Toga. See: [1]
• one-sided (the other side being a waterproof material for rain protection - perhaps gore-tex or similar which is waterproof but breathes)

Pattern ideas

• Literature (woven in or printed on)
  • The obvious "Don't Panic" and "42".
  • The self-referential "towel"
  • The guide towel entry
• "chalk" body outline
• particle accelerator pattern
• geometric shapes as per TV series
• Matched to the dressing down using the above ideas or other matching schemas (eg, in the 'chalk body outline' towel, the dressing gown may have 'stabwounds' included)
• Krikkit wars commemorative towel (as mentioned in the Quandary Phase (ep 18?). Assumed to have a wikkit gate design.
  • type 1: take up as much room on the towel as possible
  • type 2: make it cricket wicket sized, so it could be used for actual beach cricket!
• A stylised towel, making it meta.

Links

• BopAdTour - Touring the real and fictional places from the life and writings of Douglas Adams
• Press Release regarding Douglas talking about a 3D IMAX version of HHG ...apparently as a series of 40minute films?
  • See followup re this here: http://www.douglasadams.com/cgi-bin/mboard/info/thread.cgi?240,0
  • Here is a partial video of the siggraph talk itself, unrelated to IMAX. http://www.archive.org/details/Siggraph-97-Douglas-Adams
  • Alternate question for HHG Imax here: http://babelfish.douglasadams.com/cgi-bin/mboard/info/dnathread.cgi?563,0 (thanks simo for asking)

References and other notes

A Kill-O-Zap?

Guide References in other media

• Mulder (X-Files) lives in Apartment 42
• Men In Black - aliens escaping earth sing the betelgusian death anthem (from the radio series)

Coincidental(?) appearance of Guide-like elements

• The hallway "gimme da cash" mugger in The Fifth Element wields a VERY Kill-O-Zap -alike gun.
• The Husnock in Star Trek:TNG ships (episode: The Survivor, season 3) are not dissimilar to the Vogon ships of the TV series