Arthur Dent

Far out in the uncharted backwaters of the unfashionable end of the Western Spiral arm of the Galaxy lies a small unregarded yellow sun. Orbiting this at a distance of roughly ninety-eight million miles is an utterly insignificant little blue-green planet whose ape-descended life forms are so amazingly primitive that they still think digital watches are a pretty neat idea. Arthur Dent was about thirty, tall, dark-haired and never quite at ease with himself.

[hitchhikersguidetothegalaxy]

You’re really not going to like it. 

[mlostetter]

A common mistake that people make when trying to design something completely foolproof is to underestimate the ingenuity of complete fools.

Douglas Adams

[knickolas-pnackolas]

Hey! I’ve just finished this wallet today, and it’s up on my etsy store now! It’s Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy themed, and it has three card pockets, two hidden pockets, and an ID pocket.

{link}

[that-queasy-guy]

"your god person puts an apple tree in the middle of a garden and says, do what you like guys, oh, but dont eat the apple. Surprise surprise, they eat it and he leaps out of a bush shouting ‘Gotcha!’"

-Ford Prefect, The Restaurant at the End of the Universe

[kutlukam]

[liselliart]

Whale and Petunias- Inspired by Douglas Adams.

I’ve finally scanned this one in, thank you to all of you who reblogged the instagram picture- I am overwhelmed!

[hitchhikersguidetothegalaxy]

Well, That About Wraps It Up For God

[hitchhikersguidetothegalaxy]

A very surprised looking sperm whale.

[areyourparentscopperandtellurium]

[tha-kiekstah]

Marvin was humming ironically because he hated humans so much

Douglas Adams, Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy

[wigmund]

[earthmanarthurdent]

From Astronomy Picture Of The Day; March 5, 2014:

Globules in the Running Chicken Nebula Fred Vanderhaven

The eggs from this chicken may form into stars. The above pictured emission nebula, cataloged as IC 2944, is called the Running Chicken Nebula for the shape of its greater appearance. The image was taken recently from Siding Spring Observatory in Australia and presented in scientifically assigned colors. Seen near the center of the image are small, dark molecular clouds rich in obscuring cosmic dust. Called Thackeray’s Globules for their discoverer, these “eggs” are potential sites for the gravitational condensation of new stars, although their fates are uncertain as they are also being rapidly eroded away by the intense radiation from nearby young stars. Together with patchy glowing gas and complex regions of reflecting dust, these massive and energetic stars form the open cluster Collinder 249. This gorgeous skyscape spans about 70 light-years at the nebula’s estimated 6,000 light-year distance.

[astronomicalwonders]

The Colorful Clouds of Rho Ophiuchi Image Credit & Copyright: Rafael Defavari

Explanation: The many spectacular colors of the Rho Ophiuchi (oh’-fee-yu-kee) clouds highlight the many processes that occur there. The blue regions shine primarily by reflected light. Blue light from the star Rho Ophiuchi and nearby stars reflects more efficiently off this portion of the nebula than red light. The Earth’s daytime sky appears blue for the same reason. The red and yellow regions shine primarily because of emission from the nebula’s atomic and molecular gas. Light from nearby blue stars - more energetic than the bright star Antares - knocks electrons away from the gas, which then shines when the electrons recombine with the gas. The dark brown regions are caused by dust grains - born in young stellar atmospheres - which effectively block light emitted behind them. The Rho Ophiuchi star clouds, well in front of the globular cluster M4 visible above on lower left, are even more colorful than humans can see - the clouds emits light in every wavelength band from the radio to the gamma-ray.

Source: apod.nasa.gov

[scidotnews]

ESO 137-001: Astronomers Zoom in on Unusual Spiral Galaxy http://www.sci-news.com/astronomy/science-eso137001-spiral-galaxy-01792.html

[just--space]

The Orion Molecular Cloud Complex, containing the Flame Nebula and the Horsehead Nebula, among other nebulae [3269x4000]

[distant-traveller]

Distant quasar RX J1131

Multiple images of a distant quasar are visible in this combined view from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and the Hubble Space Telescope. The Chandra data were used to directly measure the spin of the supermassive black hole powering this quasar. This is the most distant black hole where such a measurement has been made, as reported in our press release.

Gravitational lensing by an intervening elliptical galaxy has created four different images of the quasar, shown by the Chandra data in pink. Such lensing, first predicted by Einstein, offers a rare opportunity to study regions close to the black hole in distant quasars, by acting as a natural telescope and magnifying the light from these sources. The Hubble data in red, green and blue shows the elliptical galaxy in the middle of the image, along with other galaxies in the field. The quasar is known as RX J1131-1231 (RX J1131 for short), located about 6 billion light years from Earth. Using the gravitational lens, a high quality X-ray spectrum – that is, the amount of X-rays seen at different energies – of RX J1131 was obtained. The X-rays are produced when a swirling accretion disk of gas and dust that surrounds the black hole creates a multimillion-degree cloud, or corona near the black hole.  X-rays from this corona reflect off the inner edge of the accretion disk.  The reflected X-ray spectrum is altered by the strong gravitational forces near the black hole. The larger the change in the spectrum, the closer the inner edge of the disk must be to the black hole.

Image credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/Univ of Michigan/R.C.Reis et al; Optical: NASA/STScI

[hitchhikersguidetothegalaxy]

Arthur Dent

[hitchhikersguidetothegalaxy]

"The insurance business is completely screwy now. You know they’ve reintroduced the death penalty for insurance company directors?" “Really?” said Arthur. “No, I didn’t. For what offense?” Trillian frowned. “What do you mean, offense?” “I see.”

Douglas Adams: Mostly Harmless