Q: what's the answer to life, the universe, and everything?

A: The entire Earth (in every version of the Whole Sort of General Mishmash) is destroyed by the Grebulon Leader in a "most terrible catastrophe" soon after this final 42 reference: "options collapsed, possibilities folded into each other, and the whole at last resolved itself out of existence ... the Guide Mark II bird, too, had crumpled out of all possibility" thus allowing Prostetnic Vogon Jeltz to put "a little tick in the little box".
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slightly out of context, but.

-joe (DON'T PANIC) friday