* * Archive: REAL03.NEW * * Created on: Tue Mar 28 15:30:11 2000 * * Number of articles: 24 * * Welcome! This is one of the files that goes to make up the archives of * Project Galactic Guide. To find out what the heck PGG is, go look at its * main Web site at , where you'll be able to * find an FAQ. * * * The articles in this file are: * * 2R36-1 Technical University Of Berlin, Berlin, Germany, Earth * 2R37-1 Tourists * 2R38-1 Jargon In British Science Fiction Fandom * 2R39-1 Cuisine Unauthentique * 2R40-2 Gruenau, Namibia, Earth * 2R41-1 Dingle, Liverpool, England, UK, Earth * 2R43-1 Park Road Sports Centre * 2R44-1 Usenet And The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Known Galaxy * 2R45-1 Amsterdam, Noord-Holland, Netherlands, Earth * 2R46-1 Bars, European * 2R47-1 Pubs Of Carlton/Fitzroy/Parkville, Melbourne, Australia, Earth * 2R48-1 Boredom * 2R49-1 Bushkill Falls * 2R50-1 Paddle Boats * 2R51-1 Miniature Golf * 2R52-1 Rice Village, Houston, Texas, USA, Earth * 2R53-1 Magic * 2R54-1 Memory * 2R56-1 Euro Disney, Marne-le-Vallee, France, Earth * 2R57-1 McLintock, Alexander Lachlan * 2R58-1 Indexing Books * 2R59-1 Canada, Earth * 2R60-1 Lecture Games * Finland-1 Finland, Earth * %t Technical University Of Berlin, Berlin, Germany, Earth %n 2R36 %s Spending Your Best Years At A Place That Doesn't Deserve It %a Sven Muencheberg (svm@marie.physik.tu-berlin.de) %d 19930609 %x Earth %x Berlin, Germany, Earth %e The Technical University of Berlin (TUB) was recently ranked the 7th worst university in Germany. The TUB is also one of the ten largest universities in Germany. The coexistence of these facts could be explained by one of the following reasons : 1. Students don't care about the quality of their education. 2. Students don't care about rankings. 3. Students don't care about anything. Answer three is the most possible selection, because thinking about the studying conditions at German universities is regarded as extremely dangerous to your mental health. Responsible for this (as well as for most of our problems which won't be discussed here) is, of course, money. Since the end of the '70's (meant are the 1970's, but due to the short life span of humans no living person really remembers what the 1870's (or 1770's...) were like, thus we can save these two digits) the number of students grew enormously, while the financial and material equipment of the universities remained practically unchanged. Today the universities are so crowded that two students have to share one seat; well, they are not really sitting on top of each other, that's just to illustrate the numbers. The Big Strike of '88: Due to this fact, many students were unhappy and in the autumn of 1988 the TUB students went on strike. You may ask: "Why should anybody care if people who don't produce anything go on strike?" But the majority of students were too busy being creative strikers to notice, while some didn't dare ask such a heretical question, and the rest weren't convinced of the whole thing anyway. So, they went on with demonstrations and meetings until the end of the winter term, in February 1989. When there were no more lectures to stay away from, they couldn't keep on striking and the whole affair died quietly. The year 1989 was then renamed into 1988b, so they could forever refer to the "Big Strike of 88." The Situation Today: Like it was said before, nothing changed (well, not really nothing, but nothing that is worth mentioning here). The TUB grew and grew, and has recently reached the 40,000 students mark. The male/female ratio is 2:1 (overall), but in some divisions, especially engineering and other technical disciplines the ratio leaps up to 16:1! BEWARE FEMALE HITCHHIKERS! Don't wear short skirts or high heels if you visit one of these divisions, except if you like to receive the same attention the earth population would pay to an alien invasion. Remember, when the TUB was founded in 1879 the ratio was infinite to one, so not everything got worse, and if a male student knows where the biologists or the elementary school teachers have their parties, he can get through quite well. TUBSAT: A really remarkable thing is the TUBSAT-A, the university's own satellite (you'll never guess what the abbreviation stands for). It was carried to orbit with the ERS-1 launch in '91, where it was used as ballast. Right now it is used as ballast for the aerospace students, who have to calculate its position. By watching the satellite's flight path you can also prove that Newton's law of gravity is right, if your head hitting the table after your 10th beer isn't proof enough to you. Anyway, the little sputnik (yes, it makes beep noises) will complete its 10,000th revolution soon and in September '93 the second TUBSAT, TUBSAT-B, will be launched with a Russian rocket (boy, the times are changin'). %e *EOA* %t Tourists %n 2R37 %s How To Behave In Foreign Places %a Michael Bleyer (s_bleyer@rzmain.rz.uni-ulm.de) %d 19930506 %x Travel Necessities %x How To Avoid Being Mugged In New York %i Travel %i Sightseeing %i Behaving In Foreign Places %e Being one of the worst habits of modern societies, tourism is something you don't want to be identified with. After all, no one in his right mind would admit to spending lots of money, travelling around the galaxy to other places just to find out they are five times more boring than home (which they are never really), or, which is even worse, five times better than home (realizing what a dump they lived in the past 30 years). No way. People are not that stupid. Well, they are somewhat, but not _that_ much. If you belong to the latter kind, here are some hints on avoiding to get recognized as a tourist, which is the only way to get in touch with the local scene and really get to know the place, enabling you to find out if the place is actually that good or bad and feel real shitty for a change (see above). Enjoy the feeling while it lasts. Your major goal will be to get as close to the locals as possible, and as far away from the other "typical" tourists, which you are not of course, since you're an exception, which you are, because you want to have some real fun on this trip since that is precisely what you came for. Some main hints to start with: 1) Avoid people with cameras and/or hawaii shirts, especially if they come in larger groups, which is not really difficult, since they usually do. 2) Buy the best tourist guide book known and avoid all the places it mentions as definitely worth a visit. In fact, avoid all places it mentions at all. 3) Follow people that do not talk in the local language, because it's most likely locals trying to disguise themselves or making fun of tourists. Finding your way around: Never ask anyone for directions. If you do, you will probably be sent to the rubbish dump (for the sheer fun of it, or because it's actually an interesting experience), or the airport where you just came from. When asking a tourist, you risk meeting someone from your hometown, which in most cases is highly embarrassing, so we'll advise you not to take any chances here. So use your intuition to get to wherever you think your presence is so utterly needed, just to find out that having finally arrived at some location, somehow you forgot why you wanted to be there (this is a most adventurous and fun technique, and hey - as a tough hitchhiker, you don't want to miss that extra bit of excitement). Weather: Adjusting yourself to the weather is quite easy, for there are two simple rules to follow. If the weather is awesome, don't go down to the beach; all the tourists will be there. Go shopping. The hotter and stickier the air, the better to go shopping. This will give you an idea of what a walk through the Sahara desert feels like, only with the Sahara being somewhat more quiet and calm, besides some live adventures to tell at home. If the weather is bad, go down to the beach; you'll have it all to yourself since the other tourists will definitely be shopping for three reasons. First, running around in a crowded city is less stressful at a cool temperature. Second, they've been at the beach for so long now, time for some shopping. Third, the beach is not really nice during bad weather, and fourth, "all the others are here too, it _must_ be good!". If the weather has been good or bad several days in a row before it changes, the rules are even more true, for tourists are simple-minded people and a more obvious change of weather will make their decisions easier. Foreign Language(s): If you can't speak one, or speak so bad that you are easily recognized, then don't. Not at all. Don't even try to. If you do, prices in the nearby shops and marketstands will immediately triple, and people with hats and long dark coats will try to sell you real gold watches ("stolen from the rich") or homegrown Ganja ("it's all natural"). Instead, try to use gestures to communicate (pretend you're too cool to talk at the moment). If you actually speak well enough to pass as a local, don't say a word either. The result of trying to make an impression is being immediately surrounded by tourists who ask for directions and steal your soul with little gadgets called cameras. Sightseeing Tours: Definitely skip this. It's a rip-off anyway, and all you'll be learning about are things like: how many stairs all the churchtowers in town have; with the weather being so terrific it would be a good idea to go down to the beach after the tour; that the city had been a really nice and prosperous place several hundred years ago, which makes it a real pity that you could not have seen it back then. And to top it off, you'll be told all this by some young female student from your home country, who happens to be doing this only for monetary reasons and not being a local at all, which explains why she speaks your language so well in the first place. Enjoying Yourself: In the evening hours, find some people who you definitely know are locals that look like they are in a party mood and follow them to their usual hangout. If you travel by car, look for local number plates, but don't be fooled by hired cars. Do not even try to get a taxi driver to drop you off at an "in" place, for this will get you even further away from the real action. Taxi drivers get paid by the tourist attraction owners to drop you off there, and the mafia money they make through this is much higher than the tip you'll give them, so just forget about that taxi idea. After you find a local hangout, enter the place and order some national drink, even if you don't like it. This will immediately make everyone else notice you are a tourist, and they'll be so excited that a tourist has actually popped up in this remote corner of town that they'll like your face just because it's a different one for once. If you then tell them that their country is really beautiful and you really like it, they'll absolutely love you, invite you for one round after another of that national drink you don't even like, and generally have a great time all night long. %e *EOA* %t Jargon In British Science Fiction Fandom %n 2R38 %a Dave Langford (ansible@cix.compulink.co.uk) %s An Encyclopedia Of British SF Jargon %d 19920701 %i Science Fiction, British, Jargon In %x Sad Bastard Test %x Adelphi Hotel, Liverpool, England, UK, Earth %x Filks %e [ Submitter's Note: Written for an updated 1993 edition of the SF Neofans' Guide, published in the USA. It will probably not be used there in any recognizable form, since a very long time after requesting articles, the SF Neofans' Guide editors revealed that they didn't want articles, just little snippets which their own infinitely superior literary powers would stick together. ] So you're interested in this thing called British science fiction fandom, but have certain reservations? Ah, it's the _jargon_ that bothers you! I know the feeling: I dislike most of it myself, but the good news is that most of the really silly terms invented by easily amused fans of yesteryear have fallen into welcome disuse. `Real' fan parlance in 1990s Britain centres on a few functional abbreviations (con for convention; fanzine for fan magazine; fandom for the community of SF fans) or acronyms (APA... see below). If someone comes up to you and starts babbling on about `femmefans' or `crifanac' or `Ghu' you may be sure that he (it is always a he) is young, has overdosed on old fanzines, and will regret this one day. All the same, British fan conversation is larded with strange terms, mostly proper names, and some of the printable ones appear below. This glossary is avowedly incomplete, because (a) a large part of the fun is finding out more for yourself; (b) although the network of British fandom is tatty and full of large holes, any one point of contact will eventually lead you to all the others; and (c) I am extremely lazy (see Omissions, Flagrant). ---------- Jargon in British Science Fiction ---------- Albacons: Glasgow Eastercons (name also given to smaller summer conventions up there). Ansible: intermittent SF/fan newsletter produced by reprobate Dave Langford. May or may not be in existence at any given time, but a stamped self- addressed envelope (where can I buy these envelopes that address themselves?) will get you the latest issue and/or information on current convention addresses. I promise. Contact: 94 London Road, Reading, Berkshire, RG1 5AU. In England, like all the other addresses mentioned. APAs: Amateur Press Associations, closed-shop fanzine distribution outfits too numerous to list. They resemble paper versions of discussion groups on more or less anything you can imagine. One British APA is or was allegedly produced by fans' soft toys. `Tonstant Weader Fwowed Up.' Armageddon Enterprises: dedicated team of detonation-loving fans responsible for apocalyptic firework displays at conventions and elsewhere. Said to be negotiating for the former Soviet Union's stocks of SS-20s. Contact: any large and suspiciously smoking hole in the ground. The Astral Leauge [sic]: dubious cosmic cult invented by Leeds Group fan D. West in the mid-1970s. All rituals, initiations and hymns are strictly optional, the central dogma being that neophytes must give 50p to D. West. Exerts vast yet mythical influence over practically everything. Astral Pole: fiendish initiation of The Astral Leauge, involving entangling oneself in a complex way with a broomstick and rotating one's spine and limbs through dimensions not convenient to describe. I did however attempt to describe it in my TAFF trip report The Transatlantic Hearing Aid -- still in print. (Advertisement.) Bar: the functional and social centre of almost all British conventions. Hence the traditional versicle and response at the opening ceremony: `And now I'd like to introduce Pel Torro, our Guest of Honour this weekend....' All: `He's In The Bar!' Beer: more copiously consumed at British conventions than at any other country's. New fans should however note that drunkenness remains fairly rare; distrust those con reports in fanzines which imply colossal but untrue drinking feats as a sort of metaphor for the general euphoria of being at a good convention. BFS: British Fantasy Society, which once upon a time split off from the BSFA because the BSFA tended to ignore fantasy in favour of sf. The whirligig of time brings in its revenges: nowadays the BSFA has plentiful coverage of fantasy, while the BFS tends to ignore both fantasy and sf in favour of horror. Contact: David J. Howe, 61 Elgar Avenue, Tolworth, Surbiton, Surrey, KT5 9JP. Birmingham SF Group: perhaps Britain's longest-running local society, this feat ascribed by co-founder Peter Weston to his having based the constitution on that of the Young Conservatives. (Jesus Christ.) Runs Novacon every year and holds monthly meetings of semi-formal character, i.e. admission fee and guest speaker or panel rather than the British norm of a rabble in a pub. After the semi-formal bit, the BSFG reverts to being a rabble in a pub. Contact: Bernie Evans, 121 Cape Hill, Smethwick, Warley, West Midlands, B66 4SH. BSFA: British Science Fiction Association. Produces six hefty mailings each year, with news, commentary, criticism and reviews (and more reviews, and capsule reviews, and reviews duplicating other reviews in the same mailing, etc). The quality of BSFA magazines varies wildly as editors burn out from over-exposure to Piers Anthony sequels and give way to more or less untalented replacements. Overall, good stuff if you like reading about SF. Also organizes its own monthly pub meetings in London; these are rather a moveable feast, but at present seem to have settled in The Conservatory (a pub formerly called the Cafe Munchen in St Giles High Street, near Tottenham Court Road tube station) on the second Wednesday of each month. It's best to enquire first. Contact: Alison Cook, 27 Albemarle Drive, Grove, Wantage, OX12 0NB. COA: Change Of Address, a handy abbreviation in fanzines. Fans are nomadic and love to falsify address lists by hopping around the country (or out of it) like demented fleas. Some percentage of the addresses even in this frighteningly authoritative piece will doubtless have changed when you read it: do not despair, but try another suggested contact, however seemingly unrelated. They're all in it together, you know. COFF: Concrete Overcoat Fan Fund, a joke unpopularity award presented at Novacons during the 1980s; raised trifling sums for genuine causes but was dropped owing to unpopularity (some had taken it seriously). Conspiracy '87: British Worldcon, deeply traumatic for most of those concerned. `Young fan, you know not the unwritten law. You spoke of _that convention_. Here in this land, men do not utter that name.' See Malcolm Edwards. Do not see Scientology. Critical Wave: news and reviews fanzine, trying determinedly to be the British Locus. Initially plagued by dire reproduction, worse design and a fearful hack-journalistic style, but has improved a great deal despite persistent money trouble and British publishers' deep-rooted horror of placing ads which might tell unauthorized personnel about their books. Contact Martin Tudor, 845 Alum Rock Road, Birmingham, B28 2AG. Doc Weir Award: presented by popular vote at Eastercons to some fan whose all-round efforts and/or niceness fall outside the scope of more specific awards. How the voting works: `Psst, who's the fix in for this year?' `Oh, a few of us think XXXX really deserves it....' If uninterested in the victory of XXXX, you might as well not bother to vote. (Seriously, there's an element of realism in this procedure: award eligibility is so widespread and nebulous that without `a few of us' in their smoke-filled room, every single vote is likely to be for someone different.) Eastercon: the British national convention, held by decades-old tradition over the Easter Bank Holiday weekend. (See, you're beginning to understand this arcane jargon already.) Something for everyone, including those who like to complain a lot, those who actually want to talk SF, and those preferring to lurk in the bar. With a new committee and site (chosen by vote two years in advance) each year, Eastercon organization wavers between total shambles and the hyperefficient marshalling of 57 simultaneous programme streams in a desperate effort to ensure that you can't possibly see more than one-57th of what's happening. Goes under different confusing names each year: thus `Illumination' in 1992, `Helicon' in 1993 (see Tim Illingworth), `Sou'Wester' in 1994, `Confabulation' in 1995... but titles can recur, as with the numerous Albacons (Glasgow) and Yorcons (Leeds). [ I don't know what the sell-by date of the Guide is intended to be, but here for the record are contact addresses for the 1994 and 1995 Eastercons: Sou'Wester, 3 West Shrubbery, Redland, Bristol, BS6 6SZ; Confabulation, 3 York Street, Altrincham, Cheshire, WA15 9QH. ] Malcolm Edwards: alleged chairman of Conspiracy '87, which see. Now too awesomely famous in Real Publishing to bother with the likes of us. Eurocon: the pan-European convention, normally merged with the national event of the current host country. British Eastercons doubling as Eurocons: Seacon '84 and Helicon in 1993. Fan Funds: see COFF, GUFF, MAFF, OWFF, and (in particular) TAFF. Fannish: one of those tricky terms whose meaning depends on the speaker. (a) having to do with fans; (b) neutral term describing those fans, fanzines, groups and conventions centered on the fan community itself rather than, or as well as, SF; (c) abusive term describing anyone even less SF-centered than one's own sub-fandom. Fans Across The World: deeply earnest and worthy organization dedicated to improving links between countries... e.g., arranging visas and assisted travel to western European cons for eastern and former-Soviet fans lacking hard currency. A frequent newsletter lists cons in unpronounceable places. Not to be confused with Fans Across The World Alliance, the international Salman Rushdie appreciation society founded by A. Khomeini. Contact Bridget Wilkinson, 17 Mimosa, 29 Avenue Road, Tottenham, N15 5JF. FOKT: Friends of Kilgore Trout, the local group of Glasgow and environs. Foundation: much-respected SF critical journal, published since 1972 by the SF Foundation. Friends of Foundation: fan group dedicated to the funding and preservation of the SF Foundation, which see. Suggested contact: Roger Robinson, 75 Rosslyn Avenue, Harold Wood, Essex, RM3 0RG. Globe: site of monthly London SF pub meetings until they moved to the One Tun, which see. Older fans sometimes confuse everyone by referring to present-day meetings as `the Globe'. GUFF: a fan fund (see TAFF) which conveys popular fans between Europe and Australia. Invented by Chris Priest with a little help from yours truly. Having been first set up to bring an Australian to Seacon '79 in Britain, it began life as the `Get Up-and-over Fan Fund': this name perforce changes to `Going Under Fan Fund' or something of the sort for the alternate, southbound trips. Hamilton Hall: a pub on London's Liverpool Street Station which housed the monthly SF meetings for a brief while (late 1992 to early 1993) while the Wellington was being overhauled by builders. Thoughts of making the HH a permanent venue were firmly quashed by its massive and life-threatening crowds of commuters in suits. History of British Fandom: there is no room. In 1937 we held the first ever SF convention (all right, there's a rival 1936 claim from America, but British fandom chauvinistically doesn't accept a gathering in a private house as a convention, especially when it wasn't announced as such beforehand. Hear those axes grinding?). Fan historian Rob Hansen has published several hefty compilations of British fan history: contact 144 Plashet Grove, East Ham, London, E6 1AB. Tim Illingworth: awesome and inarguable guru of British convention runners. Always involved with some convention or other, so propaganda should be available from 63 Drake Road, Chessington, Surrey, KT9 1LQ. Intersection: 1995 Worldcon, to be held in Glasgow, Scotland. Contact 121 Cape Hill, Smethwick, Warley, West Midlands, B66 4SH. Interzone: long-running (since 1982) British SF magazine, wittily known to its fannish detractors as Interzonk or Internoze. These dissidents refuse to forgive its initial funding, being the profits of the 1981 Eastercon (Yorcon II, perceived as having made said profit by not spending money on the convention; guests of honour were requested to skip breakfast as the budget was so tight, etc). It's a good magazine nowadays, and gets a regular Hugo nomination in the `Best Locus' category. Contact 217 Preston Drove, Brighton, BN1 6FL. KTF: short for Kill The Fuckers, a legendary style of strongly negative fanzine reviewing supposed to have flourished in Britain early in the 80s. It's not a very helpful critical term, having grown over the years into a too-diffuse phrase of condemnation covering a wide range of material from the merely abusive and inept (relatively rare) all the way across to balanced commentary which expresses negative views even in passing. LCFI: `London Convention Fandom Inc', a regular or semi-regular meeting of con-runners, believed to happen in a pub called the Royal Oak in Pimlico. This pub has been selected with infinite care as being one of the remotest from a tube station in the whole of central London. It is, however, dead convenient for Tim Illingworth (see Illingworth, Tim); his office is just round the corner. Leeds Group: centre of all fannish evil in the UK (according to certain factions), this deep corruption manifesting largely as hanging round in bars doing very little indeed, producing rare but offensively literate fanzines, and winning too many of the Nova Awards (which see). London Circle or London SF Circle... older name for the regular monthly London pub gathering. See White Horse and Wellington. MAFF: Mid-Atlantic Fan Fund, like TAFF but dropping its unpopular winners halfway across. Hilarious and original suggestion made by 49.5% of new fans who first hear about the funds. Matrix: news, gossip, media-review and general discussion fanzine of the BSFA. Mexicon: biennial convention whose ostensible Prime Directives are `a focus on _written_ SF' and `a single programme stream' -- both these in reaction to the multimedia sprawl of the Eastercons. The directives have been bent considerably since Mexicon's zealous early days, but it's still regarded as fearfully ideologically unsound by habitual runners of multi- streamed and multimedia events. What is so Mexican about all this remains shrouded in mystery and tequila fumes. Nova Awards: British fanzine awards organized by the Birmingham SF Group and presented at Novacon. Up to 1976, winners were determined by an `expert' committee and the award was decried as fallible and elitist. Since then, voting has been open to any convention member who claims to have seen a few fanzines, and the awards are therefore scorned as fallible (what do these voters know?) and elitist (how _dare_ this self-appointed minority set itself above others by bothering to vote?). Novacon: for a long while (since 1971) this small event was Britain's second annual convention after the Eastercon. It is always held in November (which in awkward years has sometimes been deemed to fall late in October), in Birmingham (occasionally deemed to fall in Coventry or out amid the wastes of the local airport). Contact address: as for BSFG. Omissions, Flagrant: this thing will swell and expand and take over the universe if I try to cover every topic. Thus nothing on SF awards, nor most fanzines and small-press SF magazines (too many and too ephemeral -- Ansible is mentioned only out of blatant nepotism), most smaller or one- off conventions (get hold of the cited news publications for an up-to-date list), `filksinging' (fan folk-singing, a very active sub-fandom in 1990s Britain -- but me, I'm tone-deaf), smaller local groups (they keep getting thrown out of their chosen pubs and moving on, so recent information is vital).... One Tun: site of monthly London SF pub meetings until driven by the landlord's rampant homophobia to the Wellington, which see. Rather too many fans who were used to speaking of the Tun meetings now get all twee and call (and spell) the new place the 'Ton. OWFF: One-Way Fan Fund, like TAFF or GUFF but without the customary return trip. Hilarious and original suggestion made by a different 49.5% of new fans who first hear about the funds. Greg Pickersgill: a Famous Monster of Fandom (retired). Scientology: do not, under any circumstances, see Conspiracy '87. Seacons: a pseudo-series with no two alike. Seacon (Coventry, 1975) was a legendary Eastercon meant to be held by the sea but shifted by circumstances to about as far as you can get from the sea in Britain (`Er, South East Area con,' the committee said unconvincingly). Seacon '79 was a British Worldcon run by much the same people, several of whom later bid to hold the 1984 Eastercon only to be defeated by the opposing Eastercon/Eurocon bid called -- to their huge annoyance -- Seacon '84. Such are the ironies of fandom. Serious Scientific Talks: a sequence of convention speeches by Bob Shaw, each subjecting the word `scientific' to hellish extremes of redefinition. The `serious' applies solely to Bob's own mournful face and tone of voice, his vast audiences normally being in hysterics. Bob Shaw: popular SF novelist and Irish fan from way back; see serious scientific talks. Never wears gorilla suits. Bob Shaw (Fake): Scots fan, a founder of FOKT and the Albacons; can be told from the real Bob Shaw by his tendency to megalomania and gorilla suits. SF Foundation: research and academic contact centre; book, magazine, and fanzine library, etc. Long resident at the Polytechnic of East London but recently (1992) cast adrift thanks to vicious cuts in education funding, the British government distrusting expense on non-commercial fripperies like science fiction, science, research, cultural exchange or books. It is now located at the University of Liverpool. See Friends of Foundation. Small Mammal: very long-running (even editors Martin'n'Margaret have lost track of how many issues) news sheet distributed more often than not at London SF meetings (see Wellington)... features upcoming events and sense-shattering typos. TAFF: TransAtlantic Fan Fund, a splendid and laudable fan institution which arranges free trips to North American Worldcons for popular European fans, and vice-versa. As with Fans Across The World, GUFF and Friends of Foundation, the money comes from fandom itself: auctions of memorabilia, donations of convention profits, etc. Small fees are paid by the voters who choose the lucky winner. Active since the early 1950s. Interest declared: TAFF wafted me to Boston for the 1980 Worldcon. Contact Abigail Frost, 95 Wilmot Street, London, E2 0BP. Unicon: a traditionally small and low-budget convention held each summer in some austere university/college site, by a student and not-too-long-ex- student committee. Vector: chief critical magazine of the BSFA. The Wellington: as I write, the current site of the monthly London SF pub meetings. Fan presence guaranteed from 6pm or earlier on the first Thursday evening of each month (with heavy depletion if this falls on Maundy Thursday -- see Eastercon). By closing time at 11pm we have usually attained a fair approximation to climactic conditions on the surface of Venus. How to find it: follow the `Old Vic' subway exit signs from the central concourse of Waterloo Station; when you reach the street the pub can be seen immediately opposite. Key phrases for gaining immediate fannish acceptance are: `You are Dave Langford and I wish to buy you many drinks,' or `Luckily I have on my person an atomic-field depressor kit which will silence that bloody awful juke-box.' See also Hamilton Hall, but not for long. D. West: a Famous Monster of Fandom, usually described in contemporary accounts in such terms as `eldritch', `batrachian', `mephitic' or `drunk'. His almost legendary fanzine article `Performance' was dramatized by noted author/thespian Geoff Ryman, to general acclaim and alarm. The White Hart: Arthur C. Clarke's fictional version of the pub where the London SF Circle once met. See White Horse. The White Horse: London SF pub venue superseded by the Globe (which see). Walt Willis: living legend of Irish fandom. Chiefly responsible for one of the all-time notable fanzines (Hyphen), producer of much nifty writing in many fanzines, the original inspiration for what became TAFF, and modest with it. Worldcon: the World SF Convention has come to Britain roughly every decade since Loncon I (London) in 1957. Seacon '79 (Brighton) was a great success. Conspiracy '87 (Brighton again) was, er, um. Next comes Intersection in 1995.... Zymurgy: traditionally, the last word. It goes like this: `Hope you'll get to one of these conventions... I'll see you in the bar.' %e *EOA* %t Cuisine Unauthentique %n 2R39 %s Food From Fans %a Dave Langford (ansible@cix.compulink.co.uk) %d 19930607 %i Fannish Food %e "Tell me what you eat and I will tell you what you are," said famous food junkie Anthelme Brillat-Savarin in 1825 (only I gather he said it in French). Looking at my friends, I doubt that this means of psychoanalysis is reliable. Chris Priest, for example, used to moan to me about his local Chinese restaurants, on the ground that they're too good. "I like Chinese _junk food_," he wailed, "the sort of dishes they never actually made in China, things like instant chop suey...." I daren't ask if he's also addicted to those greasy chunks of fried pork coated in bullet-proof layers of calorific batter with thin red sugary slime drooled all over the starch-laden result, the whole mess whimsically called "sweet and sour." This came to mind when the 1987 World SF Convention asked for a contribution to its planned fannish cookbook. A little essay on unauthentic cuisine sounded just the thing, and if a few other things hadn't got in the way (like putting together a 40,000 word fan room booklet all by myself -- more fool I for volunteering) I'd probably have contributed more than the recipe for "Sinister Langford Apple Chutney" therein. For example, when Hazel and I feel all upmarket and sufficiently demented to have more than one course at dinner, it's usually the work of a moment to nip round to the local Asian grocer's (mysteriously called "Eurofoods") for some big squidgy avocado pears. This fruit is almost my sole concession to the weird notion that raw green vegetable things are in fact suitable for human consumption. Well, everyone knows how to cut them up (an axe is not advised), to balance the hard bit in a bottle of water, and to overrun the house with tall weedy avocado plants each having exactly two leaves at the end of a long naked bumpy stem... but the eating part involves decisions. Hotels usually fill the unfortunate avocado with a curdled pink mess, studded with shrimp which have not led cleanly lives. The alternative tends to be some species of French dressing, which as far as this picky household is concerned Does Not Quite Work in the unique post-structural context of the avocado. Hence the development in our mighty research laboratories of... _Hazel's Stupendously Unauthentic Non-Vinaigrette For Avocados_ Ingredients: A lot of soy sauce. A lot of sesame oil. About one-sixth of a lot of vinegar. About one-fifteenth of a lot of Lea & Perrin's Worcester Sauce. Mix together in any order and with any variations suggested by prejudice or experience... shaken, not stirred. Put in a bottle or something, and give one last vigorous shake at the table. (This offers incentives for good discipline in the careful replacement of bottle tops. Either that or it offers an interestingly brown-spotted ceiling, like ours.) Pour quite a lot into the hollow of your half-avocado. Sensuously carve out drenched gobbets of avocado flesh with a spoon. Put in mouth, masticate, etc. (Why do recipes always stop just before the interesting bit? You never even get three asterisks and a new paragraph starting with "Afterwards.") The stuff stays usable for strange aeons, except when avocados are in season, and can even seem to improve with time. Try with various grades of soy sauce, from Dilute Tea to Creosote. There is probably no real substitute for the Worcester sauce, but fans with cosmic minds might prove me wrong. My thoughts on green things remind me of the conceptual salad which my old pal Martin Hoare and I have elaborated from time to time, when we're in pubs far away from the potential threat of a kitchen. Never actually created in cold blood, the Langford/Hoare salad is a thought experiment in the avoidance of "rabbit food." Both of us were heavily conditioned against this at the university, thanks to a college chef who believed that limp lettuce had inadequate protein value and preferred to beef it up with some nice meaty slugs and greenfly. If it were ever to emerge from its ideal niche among the Platonic Forms, this salad would very probably include grated cheese, cold boiled new potatoes, hard-boiled eggs, sliced red and green peppers, lumps of avocado (a hot point of contention -- Martin suspects this of being rabbit food), chopped onions of various kinds, radishes, sweet corn, garlic, chives, and some suitable admixture of cold cooked meat or fish.... Perhaps it would be easier to list the items which would _not_ feature, such as lettuce, tomato, cucumber, olives, mayonnaise of any description, vinegar in greater than homeopathic doses, or any of the horrible sticky proprietary messes which are called salad dressing. ("Aye," said a skeptical Macbeth, "in the catalogue ye go for salad dressing....") STOP PRESS: Martin now claims to have consumed the ideal salad, but carping critics (me) suspect that there is a degree of unauthenticity which violates even our fuzzy definition of salad. "It was great," Martin enthuses. "We made it from a pound of beef and a lot of onions and nothing else." Sometimes one does need to abandon these dizzy theoretical speculations, narrow one's focus from its habitual cosmos-wide scope, and tackle the problem of giving visitors some actual food. Hazel usually falls back on the all-purpose roast recipe whereby you take a chicken (or equivalent mass of pork, beef, lamb or honey-smeared peacock stuffed with larks' tongues and fattened dormice) and put it in the oven for hours and hours, while I try to remember dear old Professor Kurti's differential equation which gives the precise cooking time provided only that you have a perfectly spherical joint. But occasionally my excuses about inability to cook fail me, and I sulkily try to remember the formula for... _Chris Priest Memorial Chinese Casseroled Thing_ (as never actually thrust upon Chris, but see my opening paragraphs) This is guaranteed to be as authentically Oriental as Charlie Chan, the insidious Dr. Fu-Manchu, or my pal Martin when he had jaundice. You need something suitable for lengthy cooking, e.g. quite a lot of cheap nasty belly pork (remove any fat, curly tails or nose-rings), or a similar amount of better pork when you feel solvent, modulating into stringy chicken should you feel bored with pork, or kosher, or whatever. The last time I cooked this, some 2-1/2 pounds of pork filled four people very full. You also need: 1 enormous onion (actually optional). 1-1/2 cups of Unauthentic Sauce. This is made by looking up Kenneth Lo's classic sweet-sour recipe in one of his cookbooks, which then reminds me of all the ways in which I do it differently (i.e. wrong). In the following, a "tbsp" is a tablespoon and a "tsp" a teaspoon. These are not exactly SI units: for the rigorous, I've consulted Katharine Whitehorn's deeply cheering book of desperate improvisations, _How To Survive In The Kitchen_, and she says that 1 tbsp equals 4 tsp, while 1 cup equals 5 tbsp of flour, sugar etc. but 10 tbsp of liquid (since flour protrudes obscenely to form a "rounded tablespoon" while liquids are perforce confined to a humble "level tablespoon" unless possessing staggering viscosity or amazing surface tension). 1 cup is about a quarter of a pint, a pint being 20 fluid ounces (if you wish to use the puny short measure on non-Imperial pints, do your own conversion), and can I please skip the metric equivalents of all these? Thank you for this small kindness. Where was I? Ah, the sauce.... 2 tbsp brown sugar. 1 tbsp cornflour (or less, and it's optional anyway). 4 tbsp water or, better, chicken stock. 2 tbsp orange or pineapple juice (in juiceless times I have been known to throw in some crushed pineapple instead). 2 tbsp soy sauce. 2 tbsp medium-dry sherry. The technical term for this variety is, "For the love of God, Montresor!" 2 tbsp vinegar. 2 tbsp tomato puree. Tomato sauce may be substituted, but don't let the People's Republic hear about it. If you compromise by whizzing a tomato in the electric blender, the result will be more dilute than real puree -- reduce the water/stock content as suggested by sheer guesswork. NB: I'm switching to tsp units now. This warning might seem needless and fussy, but _I_ remember the chutney I made using tablespoons rather than teaspoons of powdered cloves. It was good for applying to hollow teeth. 1 tsp sesame oil. 1/2 tsp chili powder. (Or more. Or lots more.) 1/2 tsp five-spice powder. Stir all sauce ingredients together until Godot arrives or obvious lumps have departed, whichever occurs first. Put meat in a suitable casserole with a lid, together with the chopped huge onion, which I have just decided is probably optional too. Pour on sauce, thrust into a coolish oven (Eminent authority in the form of K.Whitehorn says this means 225F or 110C, but I doubt that it's necessary for you to check this to 0.5 degree precision with a pyrometer) and leave to its own devices for say 4 hours. As the moment of truth approaches, have a look under the lid and -- if the gooey parts seem a bit thin and runny -- add more cornflour stirred into sherry. (Add some sherry anyway. Have fun.) Wait a few minutes more, serve with rice, and be sure to use a washable tablecloth. One of the great secrets of unauthentic cooking is that most ingredients, all proportions and all cooking times are negotiable... so don't fret about precise chronology and amounts. This is one of those squidgy dishes which anyway never turn out the same twice running -- largely because in spite of those frighteningly scientific tbsps and tsps, one ends up (a) judging half the quantities by eye, and (b) throwing in interesting-looking extras for luck. Water chestnuts and cashews were both Good Ideas. Sugar-coated fennel seeds, Asian style, were agreed to be a mistake. (I'd actually been reaching for the next jar along. This sort of thing used to happen all the time when I worked with nuclear explosives.) I think I'll skip the Langford pear wine recipe, since it may only work with the peculiarly vile and maggot-ridden pears produced by our garden, and winemaking technicalities are even more tedious than tbsps, and -- the clinching argument -- I've lost the bloody recipe anyway. It would, however, be unBritish to close without some vaguely booze-related items. The following have been tested on recent overnight visitors, and provide ideal conversation pieces at breakfast. They can also be eaten, on toast.... _Really Quite Authentic Post-Party Welsh Rarebit_ This comes with an epigraph from Don Marquis ("the bilge and belch of the glutton welsh as they smelted their warlock cheese / surged to and fro where the grinding floe wrenched at the headlands knees") and shows how Britons can bring themselves to consume beer even for breakfast, with the aid of: Cheese, the delicate variety known here as "mousetrap," i.e. case-hardened old cheddar from the fridge, and any and all wizened, dried-up bits left over from last night's party food. Only good cheese is _verboten_. Black pepper, to taste. An egg. Maybe two if you're making an awful lot. Bread. A little bitter beer (if none is available fresh, there are the dregs of glasses and bottles from that party, and after that you can start shaking and smelling abandoned cans to verify that they contain some stale beer but have not been adapted as impromptu ashtrays. As you see, we're talking real sleaze here). Grate all the cheese and moisten the resulting flakes with the quantity of beer considered to be "enough," producing muck of sufficiently stiff consistency that it can be spread on toast but will not flow off it while cold. (Think "slime mould.") Stir in either the tediously separated yolk of the egg -- which is marginally more authentic -- or the egg's entire contents: in either case, this is what keeps the spread from flowing merrily off the toast when it _is_ cooked. Slice and toast some bread; spread with goop; sprinkle with pepper etc. as desired; grill until brown and bubbly; eat. The first stage of this recipe will always produce more of the gooey mixture than you expect, even when you know what to expect; but people are generally happy to carry on eating the result until supplies fail. "God help us, for we knew the worst too young." It was famous Aussie fan Judith Hanna who forced the invention of this succulent slime, one groan-laden morning after a Langford party. She started converting odd remnants of cheese, milk and things into a sort of breakfast fondue. After long stirring and perspiring comments of "I'm sure this is the right way to do it," she found herself with a revolting viscous mass which squatted sullenly in the pan and refused point-blank to dissolve in an orderly fashion into the thin steaming pus which surrounded it. Before starting again and coming up with unauthentic rarebit as above, we poured the results of Judith's alchemy into an unloved tree-stump which had persistently refused to stop sending up shoots. It died within a month. Meanwhile, for those with a sweet tooth, there is always... _Langford Patent Juniper And Quinine Lemon Marmalade_ The ingredients are even less rigorously quantitative than before: Many lemons. Quite a lot of white sugar. Some water. Some more water (solid phase). The all-important MARINADE. This is not a recipe for the faint-hearted. Our most recent batch of this marmalade was two years in the making. (You will need a spare corner in the freezer, by the way.) It is the marinade which makes the process such a prolonged one, since only a small amount of lemon can be properly treated at one time. The marinade should be prepared in the six- or eight-ounce liquor glass of your choice; it consists of approximately one part of gin to four (or two, or six, or one; who am I to cramp your culinary style?) of a good proprietary tonic water. "Diet" tonic water will completely ruin the flavour, although the marmalade will probably turn out OK. Ice may be added, and one slice of lemon is then slid delicately into the glass. (Americans sometimes seem puzzled by subtle allusions to tonic water. Soda water might be good enough for T. S. Eliot's foot-bath, but is _not_ the same: you want the stuff which is or used to be flavoured with quinine. Throw away those malaria chills, and walk again.) It is a well-known phenomenon, extensively documented by Charles Fort, that this marinade evaporates with startling swiftness. Quite soon the prepared lemon slice can be removed from your suddenly empty glass and dropped into a plastic bag in the freezer. It is now permissible to treat another slice... and so on while supplies of marinade ingredients hold out and the cook can remain upright. An admixture of non-marinated lemon is permissible: our 1987 batch of this fine preserve gained additional, subtle flavour from the inclusion of (a) partially mildewed half-lemons discovered in the fridge after periods of slackness in marinade treatments; (b) lemon slices included with takeaway Indian meals, and thus interestingly flavoured with a soupon of tandoori sauce; (c) country-of-origin labels accidentally left sticking to the occasional lemon rind. When "enough" has been accumulated -- meaning that the plastic bag is full, the previous batch has run out, or one's spouse is complaining loudly about lack of space in the freezer -- the final preparations are easy. All the lemon shards are thawed, pips and things (especially moving things) removed, and the whole lot chopped thinly (perfectionist method) or shoved brutally through a mincer (my method). It all goes in a big pan with the amount of water indicated above, being as little as will see you through the next stage. Bring to the boil and simmer for an hour or two, stirring with lackadaisical grace, until the bits are soft. During this period you are free to realize that you should have shut the doors and windows, since the penetrating smell acts as a long-range lure for enormous kamikaze wasps. Add _exactly_ the amount of sugar specified above... no, I tell a lie, we just tip in more sugar until it tastes "right," meaning not too bitter to be eaten thinly spread on the substrate of your choice. Another half-hour of simmering and it can be ladled via a large jam funnel into previously heated jars. Put on the lids before too many loathsome spores drift in, hoping to surprise Sir Alexander Fleming. (Our 1987 batch behaved in a semi-miraculous way: on the third day, instead of rising, it finally condescended to set.) Certain aspects of the procedure are sufficiently boring -- especially the long simmering and the even longer wait for the stuff to set firmly enough to be tried -- that to pass the time one finds oneself irresistibly impelled to start work anew, marinating lemons for the next batch. Any fan wishing to drop in and help, thus cutting down that two-year preparation time, will be very welcome. Bring your own marinade ingredients. Scholarly References: Kingsley Amis: _On Drink_, 1972; _Every Day Drinking_, 1983. M.F.K.Fisher: anything and everything. Maurice Healy: _Stay me with Flagons_, 1940. George Saintsbury: _Notes on a Cellar-Book_, 1920. Katherine Whitehorn: _How to Survive in the Kitchen_, 1979. Colin Wilson: _A Book of Booze_, 1974. %e *EOA* %t Gruenau, Namibia, Earth %n 2R40 %s Relax; Have Another Sandwich %a Michael Bleyer (s_bleyer@rzmain.rz.uni-ulm.de) %d 19930713 %x Earth %i Sandwiches %e So you actually ended up in this place, hmm? Well, otherwise you would hardly be reading this article. You don't know how it happened? Well, rest assured that this is the first thought that comes to everyone's mind passing through there. While trying to figure it out you can check out some of the features it has to offer. This is where we get to the point. Not much. That is, unless you are a geologist and interested in the wide variety of stones and sand. Besides some houses and about 200 inhabitants, there is also a road and a gas station. While waiting for a ride, try some of the sandwiches they offer. By far the best sandwiches you'll find on the continent. If you enjoy such delicacies as dried Kudu and Springbok meat (homemade), there is a little hut beside the road some miles north of the gas station where they offer this in exchange for money. I have been told it is pretty good as well. If you get lucky, you can watch some giraffes roller-skating down the road with large trucks tied to their feet. Not that this sport is allowed anywhere in Africa, but the local cops are pretty cool, so this is tolerated. Other things that are not available are rides to other places. In such a desperate situation, do not be tempted to ride with german tourists, which travel in khaki-coloured Land Rovers. They are obviously in pursuit of adventure, and driving fast on these sand roads is suicidal. Relax. Have another sandwich. %e *EOA* %t Dingle, Liverpool, England, UK, Earth %n 2R41 %s A BTEC National Diploma In Comp Studies Essay Extract %a Roy Anthony McPartland (ag948@freenet.HSC.Colorado.EDU) %d 19920322 %x Park Road Sports Centre %x Earth %e INTRODUCING THE DINGLE This is the area of Liverpool where I, Roy McPartland, live and thus seemed to be a logical place to conduct my research. The Dingle is a densely packed urban area of roughly one square mile with few work places apart from commercial premises. Its population is expanding reasonably quickly, which adds to the problem of its housing shortage. An added problem is that a high proportion of the population of the area are unemployed. As this area is not a district of the city, but a community, it is extremely hard to show on a map. A rough guide to the parts of the city know as the Dingle would be from Upper Warwick Street to Aigburth Road, and from Grafton Street to Princes Road. This text has been taken from my part of a group assignment the aim of which was to define what constitutes leisure, and highlight the leisure facilities in three areas of Liverpool. I decided to set about finding as much information as I could about the leisure facilities in the Dingle; this is a summation of this research. I felt that I needed to use one such facility as an example of the best that the Dingle had to offer. The Park Road Centre for Sport seemed an ideal opportunity to do this. Mrs. Mary Hill, the receptionist, helped me considerably when I asked her about the range of activities at the centre. FINDINGS Sport in the Dingle is quite well catered for with two council-run sports centres not to far for each other (the Toxteth Sports Centre and the Park Road Centre for Sport, which will be focused on later). There are also numerous places where it is possible top play "footie," a local variation of the well regarded pastime of soccer, but without as many rules. One of these places is adjacent the Toxteth Sports Centre and is frequently uses by local amateur teams, as it was built by the City council for local use. But it's not only the organized groups who can use it; anyone can at any time, but it is mostly uses by children, young(ish) adults, and people (usually male) in their 20s to 30s. The local police have even set up a sports club association, with the aim to bring sport, the police, and the community together. Not everyone is fond of physical exertion, and for these people there are twenty nine pubs to choose from, catering for everyone over eighteen. The older females of the community seem to make a beeline for the eight privately owned clubs (four of these offer bingo halls), while most of the men just want to be left alone for a couple of hours in the area's six betting offices. Those people who wish to broaden their minds have a choice of two council- run adult education centres, or there is the Toxteth Library, with easy access for the disabled, and even easier access for the able-bodied. Failing that, they can just select a stimulating video from one of the area's four commercial video hire shops (although access for the wheelchair bound, as with pubs, is less than perfect). The Dingle's children are able to participate in various activities in youth associations (church, charity, and council run), ranging from table tennis to indoor five-a-side football, and the vary young can be supervised in numerous day centres and playgroups, helping young parents find time to do other things, such as working or studying. I would now like to give an example of one of the best leisure facilities the Dingle can provide: the Park Road Centre for Sport. The Park Road Centre for Sport is an average size, local council run, leisure centre providing for the local community. It is built around an eighty-four year old wash house and swimming pool, with a sports hall added in 1984 (which has just recently been enlarged) and it is in the process of fitting ramps for the disabled. Its size, however, conceals the fact that there is only a limited amount of sports facilities to offer for able-bodied people, and even less for the not. See the article _Park Road Sports Centre_ for more information. The sports that are strongly catered for at the centre are swimming and gymnastics. The enlarged sports hall is dedicated to gymnastics, and the training provided by the centre is of a world class nature; indeed, many of the junior English champions have attended and trained there. This may or may not be a good thing for the Dingle. CONCLUSIONS In general, there are quite a lot of "pubs" and clubs, which cater to customers of any gender from eighteen and over, and you receive what you want (for an exuberant price) but access for the disabled is poor and children are either not allowed in or are bored rigid. There is also the fact that alcohol is a large causing factor in many violent acts, which are detrimental to the neighbourhood. The three bingo clubs (populated by 45+ year olds) are well used. Although bingo is a form of gambling, the stakes are low (but so are the prizes), and the people who play the game use it as an excuse to meet friends, talk, etc. The value for money for the game is low, but for the socializing it is not too bad. There is a reasonable, busy library which caters to all the community, young, old, male and female. No question of value for money here as the lending of a book costs nothing. Sports facilities and opportunities are abundant, which is good for the physically active (male and female between 2 and 70 years old, usually able-bodied) but not much use for those people who can not or do no want to take up sports such as aquaerobics, football, etc. The profusion of bookmakers is a sad sign of the times, being frequented by the bored, the unemployed (this includes the 16-18 year olds), and basically anyone who hopes to win a large amount of money. These places give an extremely low amount of value for money, and unlike bingo games, people do not socialize in these establishments. Also they offer no entertainment value for the young or the disabled. There is hope, however, as there are two adult education centres, for those that wish to get out of the unemployment rut, or any one else who wants to learn something new (except people under 16, who are still in compulsory education). For the unemployed courses are free, and for the working the course fees are very reasonable, giving a fair amount of value for money. The youth clubs in the Dingle are well used and appreciated buy the children and young adults of the area, with a small entrance fee. Apart from these clubs there is not many facilities on offer for the young, apart from the aforementioned sports centres (and even) bookmakers. This may point to the reason for the emigration from the Dingle to other parts of the city by young people. In my opinion, the Dingle is quite poorly provided for in the leisure sector, with only a limited rang of facilities on offer to the various social groups being targeted, the young and the disabled of the community are the people being the least targeted. The following is a leisure index of the Dingle area of Liverpool: ADULT EDUCATION CENTRES City of Liverpool Community College, Windsor Street Site, Windsor Street Shorefields Community School and Adult Education Centre, Dingle Vale BOOKMAKERS Dick Brown Racing, 122 Mill Street Mersey Racing, 478 Mill Street Oakfield Racing, 442 Mill Street Reliant Racing, 60 Park Road Stanley Racing, 115 Windsor Street William Hills, 204 Park Road CLUBS AND BINGO HALLS Beresford Social Club, 125 Parkhill Road East & West Toxteth Social Club, Park Road Mount Carmel Social Club, 33 High Park Street St Malachy's Social Club, Beauford Street St Patrick's Memorial Hall, Park Place Top Rank Ltd., Park Road United Services Club, Hawkstone Street LIBRARIES Toxteth Library, Windsor Street PLAYGOUPS AND DAY CENTRES The Elms Day Nursery, 1 The Elms Shiela Kay Day Centre, High Park Street PUBLIC HOUSES AND BARS The Alexandra, 135 Upper Hill Street The Angelsea, 94 Beresford Road Angel Vaults, 29 Stanhope Street The Bankhouse, 144 Windsor Street Bleakhouse, 131 Parkhill Road Clancey's, 102 Mill Street The Crown, 120 Park Road The Derby Arms, 365 Mill Street The Dingle, 268 Park Road The Empress, 93 High Park Street The Farmer Arms, 64 Park Road The Globe, 44 Park Road The Grapes, Windsor Street The Great Eastern, 102 Mill Street The High Park, 187 Park Road The Jolly, Hawkstone Street Peter Kavanagh's, 2-6 Egerton Street The Pheonix, 125 Cockburn Street The Pineapple Hotel, 258 Park Road Poet's Corner, 27 Parkhill Road The Prince, 2 Bessemer Street The Queen's Arms, 100 Admiral Street The Queen's Head Hotel, North Hill Street The Royal Oak, 1 Upper Warwick Street The Showboat, 6 Mill Street The South Hill, 2 Menzies Street The Star, 22 Warwick Street The Toxteth, 141 Park Street The Volunteer, Park Place The Wellington, Mill Street The Windsor Castle, Windsor Street SPORTS CENTRES AND ASSOCIATIONS Merseyside Police Sports & Social Club, F Division Admiral Street Station Park Road Centre for Sport, Steble Street Toxteth Sports Centre, Upper Hill Street VIDEO HIRE SHOPS A.H.F Video, 236 Park Road Videoland, 168 North Hill Street Warwick Video World, 43 Warwick Street Windsor Video, 121 Winsor Street YOUTH CLUBS AND ASSOCIATIONS Belvidere Youth & Community Centre, Miles Street David Lewis Association, Upper Stanhope Street Toxteth Tabernacle, Baptist Church Park Road %e *EOA* %t Park Road Sports Centre %n 2R43 %s Details Of Available Sports, Including Swimming And Gymnastics %a Roy Anthony McPartland (ag948@freenet.HSC.Colorado.EDU) %d 19920322 %x Dingle, Liverpool, England, UK, Earth %e The following are details on the sports to be found at the Park Road Sports Centre, in alphabetical order: AQUAFIT Water-based keep-fit classes for a hour on a Monday from 7.00pm and 8.00pm for #1.40. AQUANATAL A hour-long session of movement and music in the small pool from 10.00am on a Monday for mothers and babies (#1.85 or for leisure pass holders 75p). GYMNASTICS The Park Road sports centre is the city's premier location for gymnastic training, churning out gold medal winners like a sausage machine. Its sports hall is entirely devoted to this cause. So many young hopefuls have been trying to attend the gymnastics classes that the hall has had to be enlarged by 67 percent. The training sessions with the coaches themselves are quite cheap (#1.40 youngsters, #2.20 adults), but have to be arranged by appointment. There are organized sessions for beginners (under 8s) on Saturday mornings, and for "over the hills" on Wednesdays (7.30-9.00pm ). GYMTOTS This is a basic introduction to movement and dance in a fun environment for under 5s costing #1.85. It takes place on a Monday (10.00-11.00am) (11.00-12.00pm) (12.00-1.00pm) (1.00-2.00pm) and on a Friday (11.00-12.00pm) (12.00-1.00pm) (1.00-2.00pm). HEALTH SUITE Over 18s can use the centre's sauna, sun beds (for 30 minutes), steam and spa baths (which are all incorporated within the lounge area) for #1.20, if you're a non-leisure pass holder, and for free if you hold on or you're an O.A.P. KEEP-FIT Land-based aerobics (with female dance instructor) for an hour, costing #1.40. Available on a Tuesday (7.00pm-8.00pm), Thursday (7.30pm-8.30pm) and Sunday (3.00pm-4.00pm). LADIES-ONLY WEIGHT TRAINING Adults only for #1.40 a Monday (7.30pm-8.15pm), Tuesday (1.30pm-2.15pm), Wednesday and on a Friday at (7.30pm-8.15pm). PUBLIC WEIGHT TRAINING For #1.40, adults and juniors (14-16 year olds) on a Monday to Wednesday (9.00am-7.00pm), Thursday (9.00am-9.00pm) and on a Friday (9.00am-7.00pm). SWIMMING, OPEN TO THE PUBLIC This takes place in either of the centre's two pools (one small, one large), costing #1.40 for adults, and 85p for children and O.A.Ps. The times are : LARGE POOL SMALL POOL MON 9.00am-6.00pm 9.00am-9.00pm TUE 9.00am-6.00pm 9.00am-9.00pm WED 8.30am-7.00pm 9.00am-9.00pm THU 9.00am-7.00pm 9.00am-9.00pm FRI 8.30am-7.00pm 9.00am-9.00pm SAT 9.00am-4.00pm 9.00am-4.00pm SUN 9.00am-4.00pm 9.00am-4.00pm For swimmers with disabilities, special hours are between 7.00pm and 8.00pm on a Tuesday (in the large pool) for the same price as the public swimming. %e *EOA* %t Usenet And The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Known Galaxy %n 2R44 %s ST News Magazine, Issue 1, Volume 7, 11 January 1992 %a Stefan Posthuma (stefan@spc.nl) %d 19920111 %i ST News Magazine Article On The Usenet %x Earth * * Article submitted by Roy McPartland (roymcp@garbo.uwasa.fi) * %e Every morning when I walk into the office of SPC, I sit down at my console terminal, log in and start a program called 'nn'. This program gives me access to the about 80 Megabytes of Network News that is stored somewhere on the 1.2 Gigabytes hard disk of the main host in our little network. The Network News is a part of the Usenet or Internet. This is a global network that has thousands and thousands of computers connected to it at thousands of sites, ranging from individual users to big companies like IBM and Microsoft (and Atari for that matter.) This Network News is a collection of articles of which there are thousands being sent every day by a LOT of people. If I post (send) a message, it is sent to the central machine for Holland in Amsterdam. This machine collects all the messages from all machines in Holland that are attached to the Usenet. Every hour or so, this machine sends its collected messages to a lot of machines abroad, typically to every central machine in every country that is in the network. At night, our computer calls the one in Amsterdam and collects all the messages that have arrived there during the day. They are then processed and divided into groups and formatted, etc. The next morning, they will be waiting for me, ready to be read. Every night, a couple of thousand messages come in, and it is of course impossible for me to read them all. So they are divided into groups, each group discussing a certain subject. Groups are divided into sub-groups and so on. Take for example the group 'alt'. Alt contains all 'alternative' things, items that do not have to relate to computers. So there is an 'alt.tv' subgroup that deals with TV. This one is subdivided into groups like 'alt.tv.simpsons' and 'alt.tv.twin-peaks,' the latter being at the top of my list of groups to read; it is very interesting to see what people have to say about this remarkable program. But it goes a lot further. I mean there is an 'alt.sex' group, and even an 'alt.sex.bestiality' where people actually discuss the sexual attractions of ponies and other animals. And how about 'alt.satanism' or 'alt.evil'? There are also more serious groups about religion, philosophy, and of course computer things. Groups about C programming, modems, printers, Xwindows, networks etc. The 'comp' group is one of the biggest around. So if I have problem getting my TCP sockets to work, I post a message to 'comp.networks.tcpip' and a few dozen to a few thousand people (depending on the popularity of the newsgroup) will read it and one of them will surely have the answer. It is a great way to reach a lot of people with the same interests. It was originally intended for computer topics, but it has stretched way beyond that. Another part of the Network is the Email facilities. Using a program like 'elm' (ELectronic Mail), I can send personal messages to people that are 'on the net'. So if there is a person called 'godzilla' and he is on a machine called 'nirvana' and that machine is on a network called 'dreamscape' in the USA, his address would be: 'godzilla@nirvana.dreamscape.us'. So I can type any message and send it to him. It will then travel to Amsterdam, be queued there and sent to a central machine in the US. This machine will then send it to the dreamscape network where the mailhost will then route it to the machine nirvana and the local mailer there would put it in godzilla's mailbox. Godzilla reads my message and replies to me (stefan@spc.nl). The whole process will take no more than one or two days. If I mail to people in Holland, I have a reply the same day. Now you are probably wondering why the hell the Hitchhiker's Guide is in the title of this article. Well, recently the group 'alt.fan.douglas-adams' has been created. In this group, people chat about the absurd books that Mr. Adams has written and one of them had the idea to create a kind of Hitchhiker's Guide to Earth or something. It will be a database filled with descriptions of things to be found on Earth - descriptions of people, things, countries, religions, whatever. This group is called 'alt.galactic-guide.' I could submit messages about Holland, Amsterdam, the Coffee shops, Windmills, Dykes, whatever! There are already countless people interested, and it is expected that this database will grow to be at least a couple of Megabytes. Ideally, you could request any subject and the Guide would give you a description. They have devised a way of submitting entries for this real Guide, and they want as many people to contribute as possible. So if you think you can describe something in an interesting and/or funny way, feel free to do so and send them to me. I will see to it that they get sent to the right person on the Usenet. Of course if you have access to the Usenet you can check it out for yourself. Entries have to be in a certain format, available at various FTP sites and frequently posted to the 'alt.galactic-guide' group. So get writing, think up funny entries and send them to me! [Update 19970219 by Editor 8: Submit articles to submit@megadodo.com. Requests for information can be sent to librarian@megadodo.com. The Project's dedicated server is, you guessed it, megadodo.com. The Project Galactic-Guide FTP site is: vela.acs.oakland.edu (141.210.10.2) in /pub/galactic-guide] %e *EOA* %t Amsterdam, Noord-Holland, Netherlands, Earth %s The Ultimate Hitchhiker's Paradise For Ultra Cool Froods %a James Agay (u9215281@muss.CIS.McMaster.CA) %n 2R45 %d 19930515 %x Earth %e As the well traveled Hitchhiker will know, there are few places on Earth that come close to being as cool a place to be as Amsterdam. This is even more true for a Hitchhiker. Amsterdam has many special features that make it ideal for the Hitchhiker: 1) It is well connected to everywhere in Europe via rail. 2) It is completely acceptable to sleep in any public facility, particularly the train station, airport, or on the surface of a subway platform. 3) Accommodation is cheap for the indiscriminate. 4) Drugs are legal and can be bought in bars from menus. 5) Item 2 has developed into a social reality as a result of item 4. 6) Anyone with a keen sense of where their towel is can ride the streetcars free, and on a good night even take a train out to the airport free. 7) Prostitutes pose in shop windows and give new meaning to the phrase "window shopping." 8) The good bars don't close until about 9:00 AM. ACCOMMODATION Due to the legality of drugs, it is very common to see youthful Hitchhiker-types lying sprawled about on the ground. They often collect outside churches, on benches, and around the Central Station. If you find yourself trying to make it through Amsterdam on a budget that puts accommodation low on the list of spending priorities, then you are in luck. The best way to find accommodation is to be with a group of friends, intoxicate yourself severely (preferably with cannabis), and hope for the best. When you decide it's time to crash, try the train station: it's safer than further in town since there are porters that will probably prevent any _major_ harm from befalling you. If you have to rest in the outdoors, try to avoid the parks. When last I visited Amsterdam there was an average of one body found in the parks per night. (Mostly junkies OD'ing, but play it safe). The well-heeled traveler may wish to stay in better surroundings. The airport is a good choice. Sneak onto a late night train to the airport from the central station. When you get out you will be near the baggage lockers. If you are lucky (and early) enough, you may find a table to lay on. The locker area is nice all around; it's quiet and dark. Try on top of the lockers - no one will bother you there. Sleeping on top of the locker banks earns respect. If the locker area is full, another good part of the airport is the upper level of the concourse. Try the service elevator to the Admin area. It is both quiet and safe. The only disadvantage is at about 6:30 AM a floor polishing zambonie will come by. BARS Here a few places to look into: 1) The Bulldog (Basement ONLY; the upstairs is a tourist hole) Nice atmosphere, a bit pricy. Sells fancy varieties of hash. 2) The Grasshopper: nice location on the canal. Buy one drink and attempt to stretch it into several hours just to be in such a cool place. 3) La Rocha: my choice for late night. Open all hours, plus an attractive bamboo and grass decour. Good pool tables. 4) The Joystick: bit of a dive, but the price is right. Hangout for British Hitchhikers. Good place to meet people. GENERAL TIPS Find a locker - the Airport is good - and place all your valuables there. Where you are going, you won't need a watch. Don't carry ID. Just cash. Try to keep you cash, the bulk of it, well hidden. You wallet is a bad place. Attach you locker key to your person with string. If you decide to sleep outdoors with a bag, tie it to your shoelaces. If someone bigger then you wants something, run if you can. Never run without clearly knowing where you are going. Always have a safer-then-here spot in mind. You might otherwise end up in an even less safe alley. Watch out for junkies in withdrawal. They are mostly harmless but they can get nasty when looking for drug money. I had my hat stolen after arguing for twenty minutes over whether I should buy it back from the guy who took it for ten guilders so he could buy cocaine. Just be careful. They will usually settle for your hat once they understand that you have no money either. It is important to be able to prove that you have no money at all times. %e *EOA* %t Bars, European %s Bars To Look Out For %a James Agay (u9215281@muss.CIS.McMaster.CA) %n 2R46 %x Geneva, Switzerland, Earth %x Amsterdam, Noord-Holland, Netherlands, Earth %x Earth %d 19930515 %e If you have the good fortune to find yourself in Europe, here are a few recommendations: 1) Le Carlton, Charmonix, France. Behind the casino. This is a combination pizzeria/bar. The pizza is good and cheap - probably the best way to spend your money on food. There are cheaper meals but you get a lot of pizza for your money, and Carmonix is a _very_ expensive town. The bar is good, not too expensive, with small but fun pool tables, good music, and generally friendly. Be sure to order 'Bier avec pecan'. That's beer mixed with a liqueur called Pecan. It's no Gargle Blaster but it still packs a wallop. Two thumbs up. 2) La Rocha, Amsterdam, Holland. My choice for late night. Open all hours, plus an attractive bamboo and grass decour. Be careful of the stairs leading to the upstairs drug room. They are steep and get steeper as the morning approaches. Good pool tables but be careful not to get hustled. Beer is expensive (like $8 for a pint), but try the fruit juice. Drugs are cheap. Located along the main street, just down from the station. 3) The Babies, Benidorm, Spain. Definitely the hoopiest place in Benidorm, and Benidorm is a city that is partying 24 hours. A good night in Benidorm lasts until about 10:30 the next morning, then cover yourself with a big towel and sleep under a boardwalk on the beach. My personal record is 4 good nights in a row, which really borders on self abuse. The Babies is the only real hard rockin' bar in the central part of town. The decour is black. The tables, floor, walls, roof, etc. all black. The music is loud, both in volume and style. At the bar, you can only order by pointing at your empty glass or bottle, so it is important to bring a bottle in with you to order with, since verbal communication is impossible. I am not joking. You need an empty beer to order a full one. It costs about $1 per pint so plan on self abusive consumption. 4) Citroin, Paris, France. This is a place to check out. Don't plan on more then one drink since the prices are in the stratosphere. The Bar is on the Champs Elliesee. This is a place to go once you are already more then half way through your night. What makes this place special is it a bar, restaurant, antique car museum, and new car showroom, all in one, all jumbled together. At least look around. Watch out for the bouncers; they don't want people damaging the classic cars. 5) Rotterdams (bar), Toronto, Canada. Located on King Street, east of Spidina. Watch out for the neighborhood. A great, but expensive, bar featuring about 200 different beers. Try the $15/per bottle Belgium peach beer. Take a tour of the on-site brewery. Try the Sunday buffet. 6) Launbrau Beer Hall, Munich, Germany. Ask anyone where it is. Massive bar. This is the bar where Hitler survived a bomb in the 1930's. This has been one of the biggest bars in Germany for hundreds of years. Be there and just absorb the atmosphere. If you are in the mood, order a glass of milk on the side. I did; it took two hours. Mind you it was in the early morning but it was fun. %e *EOA* %t Pubs Of Carlton/Fitzroy/Parkville, Melbourne, Australia, Earth %n 2R47 %s A Biased Look At The Watering Holes Of The Melbourne Uni Area %a David McGregor Squire (dms@vis.mu.oz.au) %d 19931012 %i Australian Pubs %x Earth %x Australia, Earth %x Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, Earth %e Any hitchhiker who has recently arrived in or on a new planet, continent, city, town, suburb or indeed house (for the less adventurous) is faced with the same question: Where can I get a drink? Once this question is answered, a host of sub-questions arise: What can I get to drink? What can I expect to pay for it? What will be standing next to me while I drink it? What will it do to me (the drink OR the thing standing next to you)? Most people on Earth live a long way from the pubs near Melbourne University, Australia. In fact, most Australians live a long way from them. Actually, if the definition of "a long way" is taken to be "a distance sufficient that I feel like a beer after walking it, especially if it's hot outside," then everyone (with the possible exception of the live-in publicans) lives A LONG WAY from these pubs. This, it is widely agreed, is a shame. This article aims to answer the usual initial questions for the hitchhiker who has made it to the immediate vicinity of The University of Melbourne in Australia (having, by definition, travelled A LONG WAY to get there). Such a person will be standing in one of the following suburbs: Carlton, Fitzroy, or Parkville. If you are in Melbourne, at a University and NOT in one of these suburbs, then you are in trouble. You are probably at Monash University and you will have to go to "The Nott" (their only pub). This researcher suggests that you go to the Nott and purchase a slab (24 cans) of Victoria Bitter (VB) and then hitch to Carlton, applying a medicinal VB whenever the dreariness of the outer suburbs really starts to get you down. Now for a pub-by-pub tour of the area. But first, let us reflect upon the aptness of the phrase "pub-by-pub tour." Hitchhikers contemplating visiting the area should be aware that many long-term residents of the area in fact navigate solely by pubs. Here is a sample conversation: RESIDENT 1: "Where is `The Vegie Bar'?" (It's a restaurant, not a bar.) RESIDENT 2: "You know the Clyde?" RESIDENT 1: "Yeah." RESIDENT 2: "Go to the Clyde and then head straight down the street towards Percy's. Go past Percy's and keep going in the same direction until you get to the Provincial. Turn left and keep going until you get to the Evelyn. Cross the street to the Punter's Club. The Vegie Bar is just across the street (the other street) from you." RESIDENT 1: "Thanks mate." RESIDENT 2: "No worries. Go you blue boys!" (Reference to local footy team.) RESIDENT 1: "Ah... yeah mate." Or, in extreme cases: RESIDENT 1: "Where did you grow up?" RESIDENT 2: "Webster St., Wendouree." RESIDENT 1: "Where?" RESIDENT 2: "You know the Redback?" RESIDENT 1: "Yeah" RESIDENT 2: "Go to the Redback, head out west for 117 kilometres...." So, we see that knowing the pubs is going to be useful in many more ways than one. Now let's get started. All prices are in Australian dollars. At the time of writing, 1 $A ~= 0.66 $US. Here we go. (Here we go, etc.) THE CLYDE Location: Cnr. Elgin St. & Cardigan St. Carlton Layout: Public Bar, Bistro, Beer Garden. Description: The Clyde is very close to Melbourne Uni, and consequently has a large student component to its clientele. It is the pub of choice for Queen's and Newman Colleges, and also the Science faculty. Students tend to populate the Bistro (well, it says Bistro on the sign outside but it is in fact just the back bar), which is decorated in a dreadful mock-medieval style. Thankfully it is usually so full of drunk students and loud music that no one notices the decor. The atmosphere is friendly, and it is furnished with long tables with chairs. Also a few small tables at the other end. Depending on the student density/drunkeness you can actually sit down and talk to someone. The Beer Garden adjoins the back bar, and is plain concrete with plastic chairs and umbrellas. This is really just extra back bar for when the weather's good. At least you can spill your drinks, throw up, etc. without worrying about the medieval decor (as if you would... worry, that is). The front bar has regulars. Behind the bar is a collection of "Clyde Hotel" glasses with regulars names' engraved on them. The owner (Frank Viola) presents one to a regular on his (they are all male, or approximately so) birthday. These are the guys who have been coming there for years and think nothing of going to the pub by themselves because they are sure to meet some one they know, even if it's just the bar staff. These are also the guys who become uneasy if "Cheers" comes on the TV in the bar. Especially the fat guy who sits in the corner. (A lovely bloke called Geoff. In fact he is half the size that he used to be, so fat isn't really fair. What's the past tense of fat?) The front bar regulars are different during daylight hours. During daylight they are the guys who work for the city council and wear blue overalls and day-glo orange vests. They apparently sit in the pub drinking, waiting for the call (perhaps they have pagers) to leap out and, for instance, lean on a spade while watching another bloke dig a hole. That is what council workers do. Drinks: Beers on tap: Carlton Draught $1.60 Victoria Bitter $1.60 Guinness more Toohey's Blue less Toohey's Classic less Usual mixed drinks, etc. are available at the bar. Stubbies of many other Australian and imported beers, too. Food: The back bar is also where meals are served. Prices range from about $6.50 for pasta to $10.00 for steak. All meals come with a side-serve of salad. The steak with pepper sauce is great. Summary: The Clyde is a terrific pub, with good food and good beer at reasonable prices. The bar staff is noted for its friendliness. It is the sort of place you want to go back to. Note that if one day Frank gives you a glass with your name on it, you have stopped hitchhiking. Probably years ago. NAUGHTON'S Location: Cnr. Royal Parade & Morrah St., Parkville. Layout: Public Bar, Lounge/Bistro. Description: Naughton's is the traditional Melbourne University pub. The word traditional is used here in the sense of "used to be" rather than "always was and always will be." This is not to say that Naughto's (as it is known) has completely lost its way. It has just failed to respond to competition. It is still, however, a major student pub. Not so very long ago, Naughton's was the home of the Melbourne University major colleges. There was a stained glass window with four panels. The panels contained the crests of Queen's, Newman, Trinity and Ormond colleges. On the first night of the University year the pub would be packed to overflowing as college freshers queued for their chance to "kiss the crest," in a ritual dating back tens of years. This charming, if unhygienic, custom has now been lost. The panels have been removed and framed - ostensibly for their protection. The fact is that they were so highly respected that they were in no danger, and now the atmosphere has been lost. The incidence of shared infections amongst freshmen has not changed in the slightest, since their means of body-fluid exchange almost invariably cut out "middle-men" like the previously saliva-encrusted crest. Much of Naughton's traditional custom has been lost to The Clyde and (shudder) night clubs. Trinity, Ormond, and the Philosophy Department still drink there, which in many ways is reason enough not to. It is bad enough trying to drink a beer whilst nagged by thought that maybe you don't exist when you can safely attribute the thought to excess alcohol (I have often been quite convinced that the tip of my nose doesn't exist, and I see no reason why the rest of me should not go the same way given enough beer). It is much worse when the bloke next to you is quite sure that YOU DON'T EXIST, and is not sure that he does, and is absolutely sober. However, Naughto's is still sought out by Melbourne University alumni and college old boys and girls, and is really still very pleasant. It offers a lounge with pew-like seats deeply etched with the graffiti of past scholars, pool tables, darts, and innumerable memories for many. They still have "Bat Out Of Hell" on the juke box, and "Paradise By The Dashboard Light" is still played by freshettes now as it ever was. They also have Toohey's Old Brown Ale on tap, which is a GOOD THING. Drinks: On tap: Carlton Draught Victoria Bitter Toohey's Old (!) Guinness Usual bar stuff. Food: Yes. Snack Form. Steak sandwiches, hot dogs, pies, pasties, nachos, chips, etc. Summary: A Melbourne University tradition. Good beer, nice old photos and oars on the walls. Meatloaf discs. Go there at least once. PRINCE ALFRED'S Location: Cnr. Grattan St. & Bouverie St., Carlton. Layout: Public Bar. Other stuff. Description: PA's has a long tradition as the Engineer's pub (it is across the road from the faculty). A few years ago it was bought by John Platten (an Australian Rules footballer who plays for Hawthorn) whose nickname is "The Rat" (this is entirely irrelevant). Platten used the brilliant pub- renovation idea of stripping back the paintwork and then stopping. This was apparently done in the hope that it would look old and authentic, instead of just looking like a pub which someone stopped renovating halfway through. It looks like a pub which someone stopped renovating halfway through. In an attempt to take the place "up-market," cocktails with sexually- suggestive names were introduced. This had its usual success. The engineers still go there during the day and after five o'clock lectures. If visiting during those hours expect many checked flannel shirts, Blundstone work boots and moleskin pants. Expect heavy metal music. Expect the conversation to be about cars and football. The night scene at PA's is of course different. PA's is not a Uni pub after 8:00pm. It is thronged by people who are Out After Work. They may be identified by peroxided hair, tailored trousers (not jeans) and a predilection for short-sleeve shirts with collars and a floral motif. PA's has of course noticed the "higher" class of clientele that they attract in the evening, and have taken steps to enhance their new-found sophisticated image. Gone are the Neanderthal bouncers with crew-cuts and black T-shirts who would break your arm and throw you out into the street as soon as look at you. In are the Neanderthal bouncers with pony-tails, white shirts and paisley waistcoats who would break your arm and throw you out into the street as soon as look at you. Drinks: Yes. Food: Perhaps. Summary: It depends on what you like. If it depended on what I liked, I would say don't bother. THE ALBION Location: Faraday St., b/w Lygon St. & Drummond St., Carlton. Layout: Single room off street. Horrible. Description: The Albion is the remains of a once-great pub. The old Albion occupied the street corner and was famous for its dangerous clientele and good live music. Then most of it was sold to become a trendy women's clothing store. The bit that was left at the back was refurbished to look up-market with lots of tiles and black steel and chrome on the bar. Unfortunately, the result looks like an ornate public toilet. Also, the old Albion's famous dangerous crowd stubbornly refused to acknowledge that their former haunt was now a trendy bar, and kept turning up. This resulted in it NOT ever becoming a trendy bar. In fact, its dark, smoke-filled interior resembles nothing more than the "Cantina Scene" from Star Wars. The Albion also has pool tables. Associated with these tables is a collection of very strange people indeed. As an example, there is one old man who drinks bourbon and is constantly playing or waiting to play. He looks a lot like Ferdinand Marcos. In fact, he looks so much like Ferdinand Marcos that you feel sure that he must be: A. Ferdinand Marcos B. A Cheat C. Dead This researcher is pretty sure that A is false. B is definitely true, and is not sure about C. Drinks: The Albion pours beers from taps that say things like "Victoria Bitter" and "Carlton Draught," but they always taste awful. In fact they taste like sulphur. I have no explanation for this. Perhaps it really is Hell. Food: No. Summary: The Albion is not a place that this researcher would go to out of choice. It is, however, the last pub in the area to shut (at about 5:00am in the morning). Consequently there is frequently no choice. I know of a group of friends that have a rule that the first person to say the word "Albion" on a given night is known as "a complete idiot" for the rest of the night. This seems fair. THE JOKER BAR Location: 1st Floor, Cnr. Faraday St. & Lygon St, Carlton. Layout: Single room. Description: This isn't actually a pub, so this will be brief. The Joker Bar is above the location of the old Albion. It is layed-out as a night-club, with a dance-floor, swirling lights, those marvellous mirrored balls (what will they think of next!), girls who dance and guys who watch them. The only reason that it doesn't qualify as a night-club is that the drinks are reasonably priced. In fact cheap. In fact they have $1.00 pots every night of the week. Just exactly what "beer" is in these pots has not been established, and probably shouldn't be. The "stuff they squeeze out of the rag they wipe the bar with downstairs" theory has not been discounted. Drinks: Yes. Food: Snacks. Summary: If you dance, consider it. If you like the idea of a beer and a chat with friends, so much the better for you. PERCY'S Location: Cnr. Lygon St. & Elgin St., Carlton. Layout: Front Bar, restaurant attached. Description: Another pub owned by a footballer - this time Percy Jones of Carlton fame. This dark green pub has a cream interior. As you can see, this researcher is not overly familiar with it. It has very high tables that cantilever out from the walls on hinges. Once you realise that they are hinged, your beer never feels safe again. These very high hinged "tables" are thoughtfully equipped with very high stools (not hinged) so that you can reach your beer. Not a student pub. It often has people wearing suits in it. Drinks: They have them. Carlton Draught I guess. Probably others too. Food: Well I hardly think that the restaurant is purely decorative, but I have never eaten there. Summary: A dark green pub. STEWART'S Location: Cnr. Elgin St. & Drummond St., Carlton. Layout: Bar and Restaurant on Ground Floor, Bar, dancefloor and band upstairs. Description: A pink pub with the incredibly tackily named "Sunfleur" restaurant attached. I have had friends in bands who played in the room upstairs. You should not attend any pub which would let them play. I would not drink anything from an establishment prepared to treat its customers like that. Drinks: Yes. Food: Presumably. Summary: More research is needed in order to do justice to this pink pub, but it is not likely to be done. Well, that's about all I can cope with at the moment. Off to do some more field research. (I wonder what a favourable write-up in Project Galactic Guide is worth to a publican?) Below are spaces for future work. That will test the ability of Guide readers to update articles! THE PROVINCIAL Location: Cnr Johnson St., & Brunswick St., Fitzroy. Layout: Description: Same semi-renovated look as PA's. Has lit-up sign reading "Bar & Burgery." It makes one think. Drinks: Food: Summary: More research needed. THE EVELYN Location: Cnr ? St., & Brunswick St., Fitzroy. Layout: Description: Being renovated. Drinks: Food: Summary: More research needed. Good Live Music! THE PUNTERS' CLUB Location: Cnr ? St., & Brunswick St., Fitzroy. Layout: Description: Was aptly described by Jim Moll as a "feral pub." Wear black. Drinks: Food: Summary: More research needed. Good Live Music! THE PERSEVERANCE Location: Cnr ? St., & Brunswick St., Fitzroy. Layout: Description: Has poetry readings and bands and a turret. And a cool name. Drinks: Food: Summary: More research needed. THE STANDARD Location: Fitzroy St., Fitzroy. Layout: Description: Dreadful U.S.A.ophile decor, but good food. Shuts at 11:00pm and plays country & western music. It would WANT to be good food. Drinks: Food: Summary: More research needed. %e *EOA* %t Boredom %n 2R48 %s The Definition Of Boredom, As Well As Boredom Vs. Being Doomed %a Vincent Joseph Shuta (shutavj@scranton.com) %d 19931114 %x Dealing With The Lack Of Time %i Emu Impersonations At Funerals %i Being Doomed %e Boredom is not, contrary to popular belief, a result of having nothing to do. It's very hard to come up with a situation where a person's options are so limited that he or she literally can do nothing. Attempting to impersonate an emu at a funeral may be inappropriate, but that doesn't mean that it isn't an option. Boredom stems from the situation where none of the possible things that a person can do realistically appeal to the person in question. This renders the person inactive, and generally unhappy. Thus, boredom is the result of having nothing to do that one likes. Also, it is required that the person be at a relative state of rest, and under a low level of pressure to be bored. If the options open to a person are not appealing to a person because all of them involve being killed in some unpleasant way, then he or she is not bored. They are probably in panic, and most likely, doomed. However, the closeness of definition between being bored and being doomed (the difference apparently only being the level of risk involved) should be noted. This resemblance is what causes most people to despair when faced with the prospect of being bored; it has almost all the elements of being doomed. %e *EOA* %t Bushkill Falls %n 2R49 %s Bushkill Falls In Bushkill, Pennsylvania, USA, Earth %a Vincent Joseph Shuta (shutavj@scranton.com) %d 19931020 %x Miniature Golf %x Paddle Boats %x Earth %i The Niagara Of Pennsylvania %i Fudge, Great %i Romance %e There are a great many places on this planet which contain more than their share of natural beauty. One of these can be found just south of the Scranton/Wilkes-Barre Area in Pennsylvania. In the small town of Bushkill, PA, there is a reasonably large concentration of reasonably impressive waterfalls, set aside picturesque woods and pathways. The overall effect is stunning. And although the falls are not quite as big as Niagara Falls, one gets the impression that the overall atmosphere is quite a bit more romantic. This balance between size, beauty, and romance has earned Bushkill Falls (as it is naturally enough known) the name "The Niagara of Pennsylvania." The length of the path you take depends on what specific waterfalls you wish to see, how much time you have, and how much walking you wish to do. The first of the falls is pretty close to the entrance and is worth the trip itself. Or, one can walk for hours along the longer paths and not be disappointed. The longer trails are especially nice if you are walking with someone you would like to get to know (or, someone you already know well, and just wish to talk with). The falls are exceptionally relaxing and conducive to conversation. Outside the falls are a number of shops where rather nice souvenirs can be bought. There is a cafeteria where one may purchase standard cafeteria items, a small exhibit of stuffed versions of the local wildlife, and an ice cream/funnel cake/fudge shop of special note. Although I have yet to try the funnel cake, the ice cream was quite good and the fudge is of exceptional quality. All fudge is made on the premises, and you can watch it being made at posted times. In addition, there is also a miniature golf course if your tendencies are toward miniature golf, and areas for fishing and paddle boating. The paddle boats are interesting creations which have the ability of splashing water on the back of your legs whenever you are travelling forward (traveling backwards eliminates the splashing). Thus, it acts as a cooling effect in summer and as another conversation opener in spring and fall ("Oh, did you get your pants wet too?") DIRECTIONS FROM SCRANTON, PA TO BUSHKILL FALLS: 1) Take Route 81 South to the junction of Route 81 South and Route 380 East. 2) Follow Route 380 East until the junction with Route 80 East. 3) Follow Route 80 East until it suddenly becomes 209 North around Stroudsburg. 4) Follow the signs on 209 North until you reach Bushkill Falls. NOTE: For some reason the first 3 or 4 signs on Route 209 North claim that the falls are 8 miles away. Obviously this is not the case, because signs are not that close together. It was probably either an oversight or a deliberate move to keep the admission price down. Either way, don't watch the odometer that closely, and enjoy your day. DIRECTIONS FROM SOMEWHERE OTHER THAN SCRANTON, PA TO BUSHKILL FALLS: 1) Go to Scranton, PA. 2) Follow the directions from Scranton, PA to Bushkill Falls. %e *EOA* %t Paddle Boats %n 2R50 %s This Is What Paddle Boats Are %a Vincent Joseph Shuta (shutavj@scranton.com) %d 19931020 %x Bushkill Falls %i Hitler, Adolf's Childhood %e A paddle boat is a water craft which is driven by a wheel with large, flat surfaces extending perpendicularly from the center of the wheel. When the wheel spins, the flat surfaces, or "paddles," push the boat along. Although throughout history and in the present day there were and are large, powered craft which use this principle, most often the term "paddle boat" refers to the small, human powered version found most often at resorts. The boats normally seat two people, each with access to pedals which are connected to the paddle wheel which powers the craft. A lever, centrally placed between the two seats, controls the rudder, a vertically positioned flat slab which steers the craft depending on what angle it makes with the centerline; it can increase the water resistance on one side of the boat or the other, steering the boat in that direction. A paddle boat tends to have a maximum speed depending on the design of the paddle wheel. After a certain point, pedaling faster doesn't help because the water doesn't have a chance to take the place of the displaced water and be displaced itself. It is a water parallel to spinning the wheels of an automobile. At best, don't expect more than a couple miles an hour unless you happen to be in a very strong current. (Actually, if you are doing more that a couple miles an hour, you are in serious trouble because paddle boats just aren't designed for it; you wouldn't want to go down any rapids in a paddle boat.) A paddle boat is especially useful in family outings. Younger children and teenagers can use them, giving them a sense of control which was lacking in the back seat on the way down to the resort. It also can afford a sense of privacy to older couples and parents who wish a moment of privacy from the kids -- unless of course the kids decide to follow in their own paddle boat. In this situation the older couple or parents can generally outmaneuver the kids since the kids will in all likelihood not know about the maximum speed properties of the paddle boat, and paddle like crazy while the older couple or parents pull away. However, this should only be used in cases where the need for privacy is extreme, or when the kids are trying to ram your paddle boat. Younger egos are very fragile and you don't want them growing up with memories of how they lost the big paddle boat race. Although there are theories that a similar event strong affected Adolf Hitler during his childhood, most of these theories need a great deal more work before the connection with paddle boats can be made. %e *EOA* %t Miniature Golf %n 2R51 %s What Miniature Golf IS %a Vincent Joseph Shuta (shutavj@scranton.com) %d 19931020 %x Bushkill Falls %i The Problems With Golf %e Golf is one of the least efficient games ever created. Huge tracts of land are required for a game that takes all day long. It consists of walking around while intermittently swinging a club at a small white ball, trying to knock the ball into a small hole. Several attempts have been made to improve the efficiency of golf, including golf carts to reduce the time between swings and better clubs and balls to reduce the number of swings necessary. However, at some point it was acknowledged that the critical concept in golf is that after the golfer had knocked the ball several hundred yards, he or she is actually near the hole. Thus the game of Miniature golf was invented. Essentially, the same scenario as regular golf is present, but instead of crossing several hundred yards from the tee to the green (from the staring point to the actual well-groomed area around the hole), the mini-golfer starts out near the hole, eliminating a great deal of time, effort, concentration, and walking. It also eliminated a great deal of the visual appeal of the sport, since the impressive, vast tracts of well groomed real estate were eliminated. To compensate for this, most miniature golf courses have artificial obstacles installed at each hole -- ramps, loops, bridges, tunnels, wooden ducks, miniature buildings -- anything that can looks cute and makes the game more difficult and interesting. As a result of all this effort, miniature golf has become immensely popular. So common is it in fact, that almost nobody makes any big money from it. (The "almost" was put in only to account for some bizarre circumstance such as extremely drunk people betting large amounts of money on miniature golf. To my knowledge there is no professional miniature golf league, and no one is working on it at the moment.) %e *EOA* %t Rice Village, Houston, Texas, USA, Earth %n 2R52 %s Houston's Well-Hidden (And Only?) Oasis Of Civilization %a Jeremy Daniel Buhler (jbuhler@owlnet.rice.edu) %d 19931224 %i Rice University, Places Near %x Earth %e Rice Village, nestled between the yuppie-infested wilds of West University Place and the Rice University campus, is of interest to any hitchhikers who are searching for higher lifeforms in the Houston area. Although it is situated amidst several upscale residential districts, the Village is almost entirely committed to retail commerce. In its present form, therefore, it appears, like most of Houston, to have been conceived by a particularly demented player of SimCity. The Village boasts a commercial density approaching that of the menacing Houston Galleria, that immense oasis of consumerism from whose parking lots few return and fewer still return alive. However, unlike the Galleria, a vast air-conditioned hive wherein one expects at any moment to run across Elijah Bailey and R. Daneel, the Village is a collection of independent strip centers and onetime houses. It also encompasses an antiquated apartment complex (in which your humble correspondent currently resides), a major bank, an equally major health club (for bankers wishing to exercise), and a brewpub (for bankers who, having worked out, wish to get drunk and thereby put off returning to the bank). Hitchhikers may find the Village mysterious because stores here seem to occur multiply, never alone. For instance, there are three Chinese and three Thai restaurants within three blocks of each other (all are quite good and cost roughly the same, which is to say too much). Other clusters include two adjacent convenience stores and at least two delicatessens. While the reason for this clumping behavior is not known, your correspondent suspects that cosmologists will soon be forced to revise their theories of galactic formation to account for it. Unlike most of the rest of Houston, the Village is a fairly safe place to be a pedestrian. In fact, it is highly recommended that vehicles larger than a motor scooter stay out the Village, as parking space is at best a vestigial feature of the evolving landscape. Hitchhikers seeking nourishment on a limited budget may find the Village rather pricey; however, one of the three local French bakeries or the outrageously aromatic bagel bakery will provide essential nutrients and complex carbohydrates for approximately five of the local green pieces of paper. Important cultural landmarks include an authentic American hardware store, a dime store, a pharmacy which does not sell unbearably cute greeting cards, a used book store, and (probably) the first Rice Epicurean Market. Extremely fortunate hitchhikers arriving midway through the planet's approach to perihelion (known to the locals as "autumn") may witness the annual Migration of the Aggies, locally known as the Rice/Texas A&M football game. During this season, visitors are strongly advised to avoid anyone sporting maroon, as these beings are almost certain to be irrational and are probably intoxicated as well. However, hitchhikers with roughly humanoid anatomy and sufficient insurance may rest assured that they are only 1.7E-13 light years away from the planet's finest hospital facilities, the Texas Medical Center. The denizens of the Village are generally hoopy froods who are usually kind to strangers. However, travelers seeking to make friends would do well to remember that West University Place is emphatically not part of Houston, and that its police department, unlike Houston's, takes local speed limits seriously. Also, do not dent, scratch, or spill beverages on the locals' vehicles, since Houstonians in general take a dim view of such damage and are frequently armed. With these few cautions in mind, the adventurous hitchhiker should find the Village to be a spiritually fulfilling experience. If not, well, you can always catch Rocky Horror at the River Oaks Cinema. %e *EOA* %t Magic %n 2R53 %s Applying Murphy's Law %a Roel van der Meulen (vdmeulen@strw.leidenuniv.nl) %d 19931214 %i Murphy's Law Applied %e If you were to ask someone today, "do you believe in magic?" chances are that they would immediately reply, "don't be stupid!!" Magic is not so much a matter of believing: it exists! And it's really quite simple. Magic is just making use of the first degree approximation of Murphy's Law. This method is not infallible, because the full extent of Murphy's law keeps harassing you. Example: Take a cola-vending machine. If you put in your money and nothing comes out (and you've made all the right moves... insert money, push button of choice, feel in dispensing slot, push button, push, push, feel, kick, kick, kick, kick...) you just need someone to come along and state: "it's out of order." Promptly the drink of your desire will come out. Be sure that _you_ are not the one to state it, because it's always _the other one_ who gets the goodies... unless, of course, Murphy's Law comes spoiling all the fun. In that case you have probably relied too much on Murphy's Law. It is in the nature of Murphy's law to spoil its own effects [1]. The thing now is to act very natural, that is, to positively not believe that simple words will do the trick. Now I have to restate what I said before. Magic _is_ a matter of believing: Magic exists as long as you don't believe (in) it. [1] If it doesn't pop out immediately, it could also be that the stress of Murphy's Law is now on the last bit: "If something can go wrong, it will... eventually." Thus a lot of waiting can be involved. Maybe even that approximately infinite amount of time it takes for a mechanic to show up. %e *EOA* %t Memory %n 2R54 %s How To Avoid Using It %a Roel van der Meulen (vdmeulen@strw.leidenuniv.nl) %d 19931221 %i Games, Memory %i Cause Of Everything Going Wrong In Our World Today %e One of the most horrifying situations you can find yourself in is when your five year old brother, cousin, or nephew [1] wants you to play 'Memory' with him. I don't really have to bring to mind the agony of the smart and very pleased-with-himself child winning card by card, game after game, smiling happily at you when you got it all wrong again. A way of changing this situation is by cheating. This however is not advisable. I will explain. Cheating is not possible by memorizing all the positions of the cards at the beginning. It will just not work. Reality is that the youngsters are by far more proficient at this game and at memorizing altogether, and will by definition beat you at any attempt involving the use of your memory. Accepting this is one thing; coping with never-ending defeat caused by an extremely enthusiastic and tooth-changing child (the former is caused by eating too much candy, thus causing a fair to high glucose level in the blood) is quite another. I will go in to that later. Cheating is possible by distracting the child (A GIANT! Quick, look out the window!) and looking underneath the cards. This will only work a couple of times, until you are either not quick enough or the kid gets tired [2]. A lot of effort will be wasted. Cheating is also possible by marking the cards. The child is at this time not smart enough to discover that, but winning this way is only a short term solution. The child, confronted with this unexpected loss, will get heavily traumatized. This will surface in later years and the cause of the trauma WILL later be found during some sort of psychoanalysis session. Lawsuits will follow and there is a high probability that you will be charged and convicted for child abuse, causing loss of freedom (prison sentence) and fortune (millions of dollars compensation). The other solution, just taking your loss, is also not good. Getting traumatized yourself will cost you your sanity, time, and money (the latter two due to a lifetime of psychoanalysis). The best solution therefore is to get rid of every Memory game in your vicinity. Throw away your own old one (with which you defeated, crushed, and traumatized adults in your own childhood). Nick your brother's/ cousin's/nephew's one. It is even advised to steal and get rid of all the Memory games in surrounding and further away toy shops. Costs of vandalism and theft charges are just a fraction of the costs of the other alternatives. Doing all this will make the world a better place, not just for you, but also for the whole of mankind, for now that you've read this article and realized how responsible the game of Memory is for the mental state of the people, it is surely clear that the game of Memory is the real reason for everything going wrong in our world today. [1] Feel free to insert sister, niece, she, or her where appropriate. [2] If you manage to extend the positive result of this method up to the age a child doesn't believe in fairy tales anymore, the method will be a good one, for at this age his memory will be comparable to your's. But it takes a lot of time and effort. %e *EOA* %t Euro Disney, Marne-le-Vallee, France, Earth %n 2R56 %s Here, The Dreams Come True (Not Necessarily Your Dreams) %a Florent de Dinechin (fdupont@irisa.fr) %d 19940121 %x Earth %e "Je veux aller a Euro Disney Pour ouvrir un Sex-Shop..." Ludwig von 88, "Euro Disney" Euro Disney is currently a quite unhoopy place to go for hitchhikers: life there is awfully expensive, the food is processed, the girls are scarce above thirteen, and it rains most of the time. However, it is expected to become a much more pleasant place in the near future when it's closed down, so hang on. HISTORY: Euro Disney was planned to be the first Disney leisure park of the European continent. The whole concept of such resorts is typical of the United States of America, the wonderful huge country where you can buy everything from health or freedom to culture. Here I will expose with complete unbiased objectivity the motivations to building Euro Disney in Marne-le-Vallee, France. From the point of view of the Disney Company, it was just time to bring the enlightenment of the Disney civilization in the very centre of the Old Continent, and to give its children the chance to experience such a wonderful entertainment without having to travel to Florida (USA). (In the course of this philanthropic achievement, there were unavoidable possibilities of unwanted profits, which the company would keep as low as possible.) A careful market study showed that the best would-be guests to Euro Disney would be the Englishmen, the Germans and the Italians. Unfortunately, when you try to build something as close as possible to England, Germany, and Italy, it usually falls in France. The Frenchmen themselves did not seem to have enough cultural maturity to fully understand the educational benefits of a Disney entertainment centre to send their children to, but from the point of view of the French government, Euro Disney was an unexpected chance to spectacularly create hundreds of jobs in a go, which could not be neglected in a period of economic recession and unemployment, and most of all, of approaching elections. There were long talks between the Disney Company and the countries in which Euro Disney could be implanted, represented by lobbies of investment companies. In the end, the conditions offered by the French government made the choice obvious: they offered financial support, a good part of the infrastructure, a new motorway, and a new railway between the chosen place and Paris (capital of the country), and even a new high-speed train link to the rest of Europe, all of which would be paid by the french taxpayers. It made it easy to find people willing to invest into this adventure: the idea was to buy hundreds of hectares of agricultural land (cheap) and to let the Government turn it into expensive, ideally placed office earthground. It was even suggested in some quacky papers that the investors hoped the leisure park to be a failure, so that they could grab the land again and build offices on it. Anyway, it was a hoopy move: if I had had a few millions to save then, I would have given them for Euro Disney, too. Unfortunately, I only had half a dozen ecus and a towel by the time... Then the Euro Disney resort was built, and it was a time of great achievements, great sacrifices, and great advertising. And Euro Disney created jobs, and it was also a time of great advertising and satisfaction for the government. Sadly, it was too late: on the following year, their electoral disaster was so terrible that nobody today even remembers their names, and the victory of the opposite party was so total that democracy itself disappeared from France for a few years. Besides, a few leftist primarily anti-American newspapers complained that the jobs created didn't follow the french work legislation, but who cared: by the time, a job was a job, even if you didn't have the right to wear a beard or too brown a skin. Then Euro Disney opened its magical doors in April 1992, and it was a time of even greater advertising. Then Euro Disney did not make money. There were several explanations, none of them fully satisfactory. Some of the guests (never call them customers) complained about the weather, saying that such enterprises work better in sunny countries like, say, Florida (USA). Some other complained about the incredibly high price of the attractions and neighbouring facilities (hotels or restaurants). People at Euro Disney first complained that no French people visited them: Germans, and Englishmen would come from their remote countries, but even the Parisians were reluctant to move that far to have fun, preferring just get downstairs to the pub, to the library, to the restaurant, or to the new brunette next door, depending on the mood. Then the management complained that the few people visiting Euro Disney didn't buy all the useless Mickey-goodies, as did the Americans. Maybe the advertising campaign was too shy? Anyway, after one year, it was obvious that Disney Resort was forgetting to make any profit. The Disney Company was unwilling to invest more and began suppressing jobs while threatening the new French Government to close for good if they did not help them more. But the new French Government had had time to realize that enough of their money had been wasted in this void, and besides they didn't care for a few jobs: they were liberals, too. And here we are. The highest probability now is that the resort will be closed down, which most French will consider as a good thing, although most of the loans were guaranteed by the government on the taxpayers' money. Should this prediction prove false, I will of course have this article accordingly modified in the best apocrypha way. But now, the real thing: BEFORE GETTING THERE: Think twice! You will have to behave well far longer than normal hitchhikers can: everything there is clean, enlightened, and cardboard-smiling. The exclusive sight of so many fake Mickeys(TM), Donalds(TM) and Plutos(TM) for a whole day without getting mad and shooting in the bunch needs a heavy training or a complete lobotomy. The exclusive company of Germans-in-Short-Pants(TM), TV-addicted children, and diverse rich brainwashed people might be dangerous for your own brain. You will be brainwashed yourself, you might never be the same again. Ok, you've been warned. Having said that, it should be something really fun if you can afford it. In this respect, take your food with you! And more important, take your booze with you! And hide it well. WHEN TO GET THERE: If you really want to go to alive Euro Disney, just wait a little more: the prices should drop more and more until the resort is finally closed down. Meanwhile, stay in Paris. In general, by the way, stay in Paris: there is much more there to see, taste, feel, and experiment. After it's been closed down, it's another thing: the place is expected to rapidly become a huge squat for all the homeless and dropouts of Paris; it will be dirty and dangerous, one will be able to find there all the possible prohibited substances and the police won't dare to enter the Resort anymore. It will be much more fun, then. But you need to wait a year or two. HOW TO GET THERE: First, get to Paris. Then, just follow the omnipresent advertizing. I'm afraid hitchhiking to Euro Disney will take quite a while, as the people working there have a strong feeling of belonging to an elite and therefore won't take hitchhikers, and the people going there to visit usually have their cars full of wives and children. Anyway, you will have to be clean and correct, or they won't let you in. We won't suggest, of course, that you pay to enter Euro Disney. You will easily bribe any of the staff members, they are poorly paid enough. Or you can try to disguise into Mickey(TM), it seems the easiest way: just cut two big circles in black cardboards for the ears, have a synthetic smile and take a silly but enjoyed voice, and it should do. WHAT THERE IS TO SEE: Well, I don't know, I haven't been there either, you know, never had the guts nor the money. And very few of my close friends have been there either, I'm not that kind of guy. And those who have, God knows why, are kind of reluctant to talk about it. And anyway, if we tell you everything, it won't be magical anymore. %e *EOA* %t McLintock, Alexander Lachlan %n 2R57 %s One of the Field Researchers %a Alexander Lachlan McLintock (Alex.McLintock@chadwyck.co.uk) %d 19940131 %d 19960429 %i Alexander Lachlan McLintock %x Pulse, 101 Uses For The Pink Floyd Album %x Pedestrian Crossings In High Street Kensington, London, England, UK %x Ambient Video %x Personal Stereos %x Ozone %x Hyneline, R. A. %x Playbeing Centrefolds %x Wine Tasting %x Real Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, The %x Filks %x Imperial College Science Fiction Society %x Tea %x Watford, London, UK, Earth %x Indexing Books %x Cambridge, England, UK, Earth %x Oxford University Speculative Fiction Group (OUSFG) %x Adelphi Hotel, Liverpool, England, UK, Earth %x Grantchester, Near Cambridge, England, UK, Earth %x Unix, Part 1 %x FTP, A Boring Article On How To Use %x Philosophy %x Unix, Part 2 %x Unix, Part 3 %x Rocky Horror Picture Show At The Prince Charles Cinema %x Aardvarks %x Encyclopedia of Science Fiction %x Dietary Bachelorisms %x alt.test %x Netherlands, Earth %x Moon, The %x Mars %x Trainers %x Soushe Awwl Atissu! %x Legendary Tree People of Brent, The (TM) %x Sad Bastard Test %x Television Addiction %x Space Safe Coke Can %x Writers' Block %x CASIP And AAAAAAA %x Rocks And Electricity %x Sports: Words One Should Know %x Hemel Hempstead, Hertfordshire, England, UK, Earth %e Born in 1971, the eldest son of an English-Cypriot and an English-Scot, (both of whom were Londoners) I spent the first ten years of my life in Barnet, North London, England, UK. I spent the next six in Limassol, Cyprus, followed by various periods in Hertfordshire and London for A'Levels, Imperial College, and finally work. I have been known as: zmacy61@doc.ic.ac.uk alm@doc.ic.ac.uk amclintock@cix.compulink.co.uk alexmc@cray-communications.co.uk alexmc@biccdc.co.uk and now I am: Alex.McLintock@chadwyck.co.uk I also have a dial up internet account with the British internet provider known as Demon Internet Services. This account (alex@arcfan.demon.co.uk) will be restored as soon as I buy a modem. I have a very high opinion of myself, so unless people tell me otherwise I shall think that my PGG articles deserve the Booker Prize. Please do criticize them. Any constructive comments are welcome, e.g. "I don't understand _x_" or "_y_ is boring." I also have a tendency to talk drivel and write in totally convoluted English. All articles written by me are Copyright Alex McLintock. They may be copied and distributed for any edition of the Project Galactic Guide. They may not be separated from the Guide or used for any purpose other than as a part of the Project Galactic Guide. (Ask first!) I own three Acorn computers and wrote the Risc OS specific version of the Guide, for use with !StrongHelp. I have since abandoned that strategy in favour of html files and html browsers (such as those used for World Wide Web access). I would love to hear suggestions on things in England that people might want to know about. (This excludes the Lake District. Roel would like me to write about it, but I don't know anything). Enjoy! %e *EOA* %t Indexing Books %n 2R58 %s Alphabetical Order %a Alexander Lachlan McLintock (alexmc@biccdc.co.uk) %d 19940204 %x Imperial College Science Fiction Society %e Indexing is a subject close to the hearts of many science fiction fans. A knowledge of how to catalogue books will aid you in obtaining temporary work in any English Speaking Library. Unfortunately, I cannot impart that knowledge to you. In my college days I had the dubious task of stock-taking the ICSF library. This involved the checking of over 2,000 books against a paper list, seeing which ones had been stolen since the year before. Had those books been un-indexed we would have lost books to nimble thieves all the time! There is a second-hand book seller in London who orders every book he gets. He reads them in strict order of purchase. A recent exercise involved sorting around one hundred books into alphabetical order. Certain conventions allow easy decisions. "Banks" goes before "Clarke," and "Pohl" goes before "Pratchett." However, some are less than certain. Does "Orson Scott Card" go under "S" or "C"? Does "Temps" - edited by Neil Gaiman and Alex Stewart go under "G," or "S," or is a separate section for anthologies required? Staying with Neil Gaiman, does his "Official Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy Companion" go under "G" or next to all the books by "Adams"? (Or perhaps it goes with all the Sandman comics in a box on the floor). Do you place all volumes in the Hitchhiker Trilogy in alphabetical order of title, or chronological order of publication? (You need to be topologically confused to try placing them in chronological order of the events in the story...) Do you place John Norman's "Gor" books between "M" and "O" or in "B" (for "Bin")? You may think that this is not a subject worthy of many brain cells, but consider this: Those hundred books are just the _read_ collection. There is another nine-foot shelf of unread paperbacks, a shelf full of videos including every Star Trek episode in order of first broadcast, two smaller shelves of large non-fiction, a row of boxes with comics, and a final shelf with glasses. Think of the state we would be in if they were all mixed up, un-indexed! %e *EOA* %t Canada, Earth %n 2R59 %s Not All Canadians Are Frigid %a Kurt Fitzner (kurt@traider.ersys.edmonton.ab.ca) %d 19940118 %x Earth %e To Canadians, Canada is "just zis country, you know." To visitors, it is the coldest country on the planet (with an average year-round temperature of -5). While Canadians take distinct pleasure in travelling to a city, say like Chicago, and watching the entire population get traumatized and see all of the city's infrastructure grind to a halt when the temperature dips below -10 (centigrade) and they get 2 inches of snow, it is interesting to note that these same people, say from Chicago, take a distinct pleasure in the Canadians taking a distinct pleasure in watching them suffer. It seems to go something like this: Canadian: (observing snow, and -10 degree temperatures) "............." Chicagoan: (scratches head) Canadian: "Look at that bus......get a load of the huge coat that lady is wearin