In the winter of 1992, I was allowed, by the Gods or perhaps by Slartibartfast, to interview Douglas Adams for my college newspaper, The UWM Post. Not only interview, but spend an entire HOUR in the same room with him.

I was a wreck. I listened to the audio tape of our interview a few years back and you can tell what a disaster I am. Luckily Mr. Adams was gracious enough to notice that his interviewer was suffering from terminal hero worship and was nothing but considerate.

Arthur Dent, Ford Prefect, Trillian, Marvin the Robot... all very dear friends of mine growing up.

They hired kid-lit author Eoin Colfer to helm a sixth book called "And Another Thing..." Came out last year. While not a total disaster, it's just not the same.

Read it when I was 16. It had a momentous impact on my appreciation of humour and irony. Have to remember to pull it off the shelf for my own son to read in due time!

@Jeffrey: Very cool!

@TT: I read it aloud to my youngest son, complete with multiple accents!