Grab Your Towels!

It's Towel Day! A day designated to honor Douglas Adams, creator of The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy!

Hitchhiker is a five book trilogy that stars mild mannered Arthur Dent as the hero in his many adventures around the galaxy

The actual Hitchhiker's Guide is an electronic book that is just that, a guide to the galaxy for intergalactic hitchhikers. Mind you, this was from Douglas Adams' mind in the late 1970's. He was way ahead of his time. It was easy to use, and comforting to have because on the cover, in big letters, were the words Don't Panic!

And the reason that the day memorializing Douglas Adams is called Towel Day? In the first book, The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy, Arthur meets a human like alien named Ford Prefect. He is going to take Arthur with him just before the earth is to be destroyed. Ford tells him to be sure to get his towel. The guide has quite a few things to say about towels.

"A towel, it says, is about the most massively useful thing an interstellar hitchhiker can have." It goes on to list how it can be used for warmth, as a beach towel, as a sail, as a tent, and as a head wrap. But perhaps the most important usage is psychological. Knowing where your towel is means you have got it together. A non-hitchhiker will think that anyone who travels the cosmos and can keep track of his towel must be someone to be reckoned with.

When I was sailing to the BVI and up and down the eastern seaboard I would always make sure that I knew where my towel was. Occasionally I would run into others who also saw the importance of having your towel. It was like an inside joke among us Douglas Adams fans.

If you haven't yet, please give The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy a read. It is easy to read and even easier to love.

I find the instructions Don't Panic to be quite helpful in many situations.

Happy Towel Day! Now, where is mine?