And for all the richest and most successful merchants life inevitably became rather dull and niggly, and they began to imagine that this was therefore the fault of the worlds they'd settled on.

'Totally mad,' he said, 'utter nonsense. But we'll do it because it's brilliant nonsense.'

When you're cruising down the road in the fast lane and you lazily sail past a few hard-driving cars and are feeling pretty pleased with yourself and then accidently change down from fourth to first instead of third thus making your engine leap out of your hood in a rather ugly mess, it tends to throw you off stride in much the same way that this remark threw Ford Prefect off his.

Very deep. You should send that in to the Reader's Digest. They've got a page for people like you.

"What's so unpleasant about being drunk?" "Ask a glass of water."

Many words and expressions which only a matter of decades ago were considered so distastefully explicit that, were they merely to be breathed in public, the perpetrator would be shunned, barred from polite society, and in extreme cases shot through the lungs, are now thought to be very healthy and proper, and their use in everyday speech and writing is evidence of a well-adjusted, relaxed and totally un****ed-up personality.

You just come along with me and have a good time. The Galaxy's a fun place. You'll need to have this fish in your ear.