It is an important and popular fact that things are not always what they seem. For instance, on the planet Earth, man had always assumed that he was … - Douglas Adams

After a while he played with the pencil and the paper again and was delighted when he discovered how to make a mark with the one on the other. Various noises continued outside, but he didn't know whether they were real or not. He then talked to his table for a week to see how it would react.

When you're cruising down the road in the fast lane and you lazily sail past a few hard-driving cars and are feeling pretty pleased with yourself and then accidently change down from fourth to first instead of third thus making your engine leap out of your hood in a rather ugly mess, it tends to throw you off stride in much the same way that this remark threw Ford Prefect off his.

ABOYNE (vb.) To beat an expert at a game of skill by playing so appallingly badly that none of his clever tactics or strategies are of any use to him.