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The Toaster
Professor P
laid the table and put two slices of bread in the toaster. It burst into
life.
“Would
you like a joke?” it piped.
“No,
thank you,” he replied. “Just the toast.”
“How do
you get two large dinosaurs into a small phone box?” the toaster
continued anyway.
“I don’t
know,” he sighed. “Now toaster, will you please make the toast!”
“With
difficulty!” it said, roaring with laughter.
Tomatoes
Professor
P made us some peanut butter and tomato sandwiches. The tomatoes tasted
good but I noticed that they were a strange pink colour.
“Hope you
like the tomatoes,” said Professor P. “I grow them myself in the
greenhouse. Don’t you think that it’s so boring the way that tomatoes
are always red? I much prefer them different colours.”
“Brilliant!” I said. “I’ve never had pink ones before.”
Bugs
“Business has been going rather slowly
recently,” Professor P explained to us.
“Teething problems, nothing serious.”
“Are you
selling your inventions?” I asked.
“Not
yet,” he replied. “That’s the problem. None of my products are ready
yet. It takes a long time to get the bugs ironed out.”
Floppy
turned into a pink hyena and laughed loudly.
“And even
the bugs have bugs!” he quipped.
Floppy Forever
I ran
after Professor P and caught up with him outside his house. He was
pushing at the front door and his face was red with frustration.
“Open up,
Door, will you?” he cried. “I’m in a hurry.”
“I’m
sorry, Professor P,” the door piped in an apologetic voice. “I can’t let
you in without the password.”
“But I
don’t need a password. It’s me, Professor P.”
“Floppy
reprogrammed me,” it said. “Everybody has to use a password now.”
“Floppy
did what?” he cried. “Just wait till I find that little rabbit!”
“Can you
tell us what the password is?” I asked the door.
“I
shouldn’t really,” the door replied doubtfully. “Not without a very good
reason.”
“If you
don’t tell me,” Professor P said angrily, “you’re firewood! Is that a
good enough reason?”
“Yes, I
believe that is a very good reason,” the door said quietly, in a rather
dignified manner. “The password is Floppy Forever.”
“Floppy
Forever,” Professor P cried and the door burst open.
More Bugs
“Oh, bugs don’t
matter,” Floppy sniffed. “I’ve lived with bugs all my life and it hasn’t
done me any harm.”
Parents
“Parents?” Floppy
said in surprise. “Let me see,” he paused, “checking extended database
for all references to ‘parents’.”
He went
quiet for a few moments and then said, “No, there’s no need to worry
about parents.”
“But…”
Tara started.
“I have
performed a thorough check, Tara,” he said in a slightly irritated tone.
“Trust me. Parents are not relevant in this situation. Now you will need
to take…”
Coelacanth
“They’re
amazing,” I said. “How do they know the animals really looked like
that?”
“Well,
palaeontologists don’t know for certain,” Mary replied. “They spend
their lives studying fossils and trying to piece together the facts. It
isn’t easy and sometimes they make mistakes. Big mistakes in fact! They
once decided that a fossil fish called a coelacanth was a missing link
in evolution – a fish that walked out of the water and became the first
to dwell on land 350 million years ago. But they were soon in for a big
surprise!”
“Why,
what happened?” I asked.
“Well,”
she laughed, “a fisherman caught one in his net. The coelacanth wasn’t
extinct after all!”
Disaster!
“I’m
going to take a look at the cave,” Professor P said.
He
crouched down and disappeared into the tunnel. I waited impatiently for
him to return. He finally reappeared and stood up slowly.
“Disaster,” he cried.
“What is
it Professor P? What’s the matter?” I asked.
“Bumped
my head on the roof of the tunnel. Very painful,” he said, rubbing his
head.
Time travel
“It took
me years of searching before I finally stumbled on the secret of time
travel. You see, time travel happens all the time.”
“It
does?”
“Yes, it
does,” he nodded. “Step into a phone box. Wait five minutes and step
out. The phone box has transported you five minutes into the future.”
“But…” I
began.
“When you
understand what makes time move forwards,” he continued. “You can make
it go backwards.”
Kitchen Sink!
“Oh, I
forgot,” Tara said, going over to her rucksack. “The serviettes.”
She
handed me a pink one. “Thanks,” I said, surprised.
As Tara
served out the spaghetti I pulled her rucksack over towards me and
looked carefully inside it.
“What are
you looking for, Peter?” she asked puzzled.
“Oh, I
was just wondering where you put the kitchen sink,” I replied casually.
Mary's TV
We went outside
and Mary locked the shop door.
“I wonder
how Professor P has been getting on,” I said.
“Do you
want to come back to my house and find out?” she asked. “You can stay
for supper if you like.”
“Thanks,”
we replied.
Mary
lived in a pretty little cottage with a very colourful and tidy garden.
We went inside and she pushed at the living room door.
“Professor P?” she called, “are you in there? I can’t get the door
open.”
“One
moment,” he replied.
I heard
something heavy being moved. The door opened and we went inside. Mary
gasped in horror. Tara looked at me and giggled. The room was a
disaster. Electronic equipment was piled high on every surface and the
floor was covered in tubes, wires and electronic components. Mary’s
television was lying upside down in the centre of the room with the back
removed.
“My
television!” Mary cried.
“Yes, I
hope you didn’t mind, I needed to use it to…”
“Is it
all right?” she interrupted.
“Well, it
is rather old,” he replied. “But it does the job.”
“I mean,
what have you done to it?”
“Just
borrowed the high voltage circuitry.”
“But…”
she stammered.
“Don’t
worry, it will be fine,” he said. “I’ll be finished in a few minutes and
I’ll put it back together then. It should work a bit better, in fact.
You’ll be able to get a few extra channels.”
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