經典科幻文學:《銀河系漫遊指南》第8章 Part 2

The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy says that if you hold a lungful of air you can survive in the total vacuum of space for about thirty seconds. However it goes on to say that what with space being the mind boggling size it is the chances of getting picked up by another ship within those thirty seconds are two to the power of two hundred and sixty-seven thousand seven hundred and nine to one against. By a totally staggering coincidence that is also the telephone number of an Islington flat where Arthur once went to a very good party and met a very nice girl whom he totally failed to get off with — she went off with a gatecrasher.
Though the planet Earth, the Islington flat and the telephone have all now been demolished, it is comforting to reflect that they are all in some small way commemorated by the fact that twenty-nine seconds later Ford and Arthur were rescued.
A computer chatted to itself in alarm as it noticed an airlock open and close itself for no apparent reason.
This was because Reason was in fact out to lunch.
A hole had just appeared in the Galaxy. It was exactly a nothingth of a second long, a nothingth of an inch wide, and quite a lot of million light years from end to end.
As it closed up lots of paper hats and party balloons fell out of it and drifted off through the universe. A team of seven three-foot-high market analysts fell out of it and died, partly of asphyxication, partly of surprise.
Two hundred and thirty-nine thousand lightly fried eggs fell out of it too, materializing in a large woobly heap on the famine-struck land of Poghril in the Pansel system.
The whole Poghril tribe had died out from famine except for one last man who died of cholesterol poisoning some weeks later.

《銀河系漫遊指南》上說，如果你吸入滿滿一肺的空氣，那麼你能在絕對真空的太空裏存活大約30秒。然而，它沒有繼續說，在如此廣袤無垠的太空中，你在這30秒內被另一艘飛船救起的概率是2的276，709次方比1.一個令人難以置信的巧合是，276，709恰恰是伊思林頓一座公寓的電話號碼，阿瑟曾經在那兒參加過一場非常精彩的派對。他在派對上遇到了一個很不錯的姑娘，但他卻沒能和這個姑娘多親熱——她被一個闖派對者搶跑了。
雖然地球、伊思林頓的這座公寓，以及這個電話號碼現在統統灰飛煙滅了，但令人鼓舞的是，它們全都通過下述事實得到了一絲微薄的紀念——29秒之後，福特和阿瑟獲救了。
當發現了一個氣閘沒有任何原因地打開又自動關上後，—臺電腦開始不停地自動報警。
實際上，找不到原因，原因大概出去吃午飯了。
一個洞出現在銀河系裏。確切地說，它僅僅只存在了一秒鐘，僅僅只有一英寸寬，但洞兩頭之間的距離卻有好幾百萬光年。
當它關閉時，許多紙帽子和派對氣球從裏面掉出來，慢慢地飄過整個宇宙。還有一隊7個3英尺高的市場分析家掉出來，已經死了，部分是由於窒息，部分則是由於驚訝。
239，000個煎得很嫩的雞蛋也掉了出來，組成搖擺不定的一大堆，落在正飽受饑荒折磨的潘塞爾星系的普格瑞爾大陸上。
整個普格瑞爾大陸的部落已經全部死於饑荒，只有最後倖存的一個人，而這個人幾周後也死於膽固醇中毒。