I was still going to school when I came across Douglas Adams through radio plays. And apparently, this is how the increasingly inaccurately numbered trilogy came to be. But that is not so important. What is important in my humble opinion is the amalgam of absurd or apparently absurd ideas all mixed together. And even as a scientist by education I can enjoy reading the countless episodes of "impossible" things, which in the end are far to plausible to be truely impossible. I agree, that if you come home now from a few years of space-time travel, people will not believe you anyway.
One of my favourites is "The Zen Method of Navigation" --- if you do not know, how to get to your destination, chose a vehicle that looks like it knows, where to go. Follow it. At the very least, it's going to be interesting. :)
There are sideline stories like "Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency" and "The Electric Monk".
I would say, Douglas Adams invented a whole new genre of SciFi. And at the very least it should stimulate your imagination.