1022 - FINCH

This is my 9-year-old Granddaughter's version:

Garfield awoke one morning only to hear a really disturbing noise. He tried to go back to sleep, but whatever that thing was, it was real noisy so Garfield decided to wake up once and for all. He looked at the clock, 6:25! Eeeek! Garfield groaned, "I'd like to pinch the person that is making all that noise!" It turned out it was John. He was making breakfast and apparently he had checked yesterday and there was going to be a beautiful sunrise. So John had planned to have a nice breakfast outside and watch the sunrise and do an hour of bird watching. Once Garfield found out, he was angry with rage. "A day out in the sunshine at six-O-clock?!!! He's mad! And he's got to be nuts to think that I would join him!", stuttered Garfield, trembling with anger. Garfield tried to signal John and shout to him, 'that it was a bad idea' and, 'don't expect me to join you' and, 'you woke me up from a really good dream' and all that nonsense. But John didn't hear a word because he was so focused and exited to make this the best sunrise day ever! Garfield turned on the piano, cranked the volume up to the loudest, and struck a minim to get his attention. John was in the middle of buttering peanut butter and jam onto a slice of toast and the note made him jump out of his skin! "Oh, heh heh, Garfield, didn't see ya there buddy, how about you join me in some..." But Garfield interrupted by stuttering, "don't even think about it!" Garfield grabbed 2 marshmallows and stuffed them in his ears then went back to bed. John went bird watching 2 hours later and saw 1 finch, 2 blue tits, 7 sparrows, 3 gulls, 4 crows and like a million pigeons! Meanwhile, Garfield was in the middle of a really good dream. To make the story short, basically, Garfield used a winch to pull up a giant plate of lasagne and John and Odie go to jail.

At sunrise Garfield wanted to be asleep still

This is my version:

Aaron lives with his parents and sisters, Keri and Megan, in a spacious house. When Aaron's piano teacher, Mrs Whittaker, arrives, the music room is pretty noisy, what with all the children talking at once and squabbling over things. At the sight of the serious face of Mrs Whittaker being shown into the room, Keri and Megan feel obliged to go elsewhere. Aaron starts on one of his pieces. "No, no", interrupts Mrs Whittaker, "that's a minim there - you are playing it like a crotchet. Try again." Aaron is just about to pinch a piece of Keri's paper to write a reminder to himself about the minim, when Keri pops in for something. "Don't even think about it!", chides Keri. Megan is into all things mechanical and is currently trying to see if the electric winch on the old Landrover is strong enough to pull the vehicle even with the handbrake on. Keri is very different and loves observing the garden's wild life. As she is watching, first one Green Finch shows up at the garden feeder, then five more.

Old Landrover front winch

1021 - WRIST

This is my 9-year-old Granddaughter's version:

John had said to Garfield and Odie one day, "I'm going jogging wiTh my pals, so don't get up to any mischief!" Once John had left, GaRfield took his sweet time and wrecked the house like a king. First he wrecked all of John's favourite ferns (whose names were Tim, Rose, Honey, Pixie-stormray, and Larry Mcdufus). Then he went through all the cupboards and knocked down all the food that was on them. Then he clawed the armchair. Then he broke John's Mum's absolute favourite vase. And then he told Odie to go and chew John's new Easter bunny slippers while he, Garfield, switched the television on and sat down with a warm plate of lasagne beside him. When John came back, he said, "Garfield, Odie I'm home, by the way, I injured my wrist while I was... Hey! Why is there grist on the flo... Aaaaaargh! what a mess! Garfield, do you know what happened?" Garfield was still on the sofa with the TV in front of him. "Well, it was all an accident you see, Odie and I were... ", began Garfield, but John stopped him. "I don't want to hear it! My ferns! Tim, Rose, Honey, Pixie, Larry! My ferns, speak to me!, all my food, and my fave ginger biscuits, and my new armchair, Mum's vase! Garfield, do know how precious that vase is? Could this get any worse?" Just then, Odie came down with John's chewed-on slippers in his mouth. "I had to ask, of course it could!", John sighed.

Garfield and the vase

This is my version:

The specialist bRead maker did all the work from the grain to the loaf. So sometimes you'd find him behind the front desk serving customers and at other times you'd find him in the mill loft adding grist to the mill wheel to make the flour. One day he hurt himself after a fall playing football. He had to employ someone to take over the heavier work whilst his wrist healed. The worker turned out to be rather good and his sales actually increased, so he made the employee's job permanent.

The baker-cum-miller adding wheat to the grist mill

1020 - CLIMB

This is my 9-year-old Granddaughter's version:

"Why do humans put food on high places to cooL? Why couldn't they put it somewhere lower?!", sighed Garfield who was staring at a plump, juicy chicken that John had placed on top of the refrigerator to cool off. After his 36th attempt to climb the refrigerator, Garfield finally decided to wait till dinner. Lizz was coming for dinner so John was cooking an especially tasty meal which was lasagne, chicken and lemon cheesecake for dessert. While he was waiting for dinner, Garfield wandered over to where the plumber was trying to plumb the upper bathroom sink (since Garfield had got his tail stuck in the drain while trying to have a drink yesterday). DING! Lizz had arrived. Lizz sat on the sofa applying lip gloss until supper. When tea was ready, John called, "Food time! Come on Lizz, Garfield hurry up, it's lasagne your fave!" At the thought of lasagne Garfield licked his lips and about 5 seconds later, Odie was watching Garfield slink to the table wondering what on earth had happened.

John had made a delightful looking lasagne with roast chicken

This is my version:

Len arrived at the house to progress the bathroom installation. The house cat was raised from its cosy place by the hot water tank in the bathroom at the sound of the door opening. On seeing Len the cat decided to slink away to somewhere quieter to doze. Len put down the tin of gloss paint that he'd need later and set to to plumb in the bath. This was not easy for Len as he was rather plump. Once he'd finished the plumbing, he had to climb the loft ladder to turn the hot water supply back on. He barely fitted through the access door!

Len installing the bath

1019 - PLAIT

This is my 9-year-old Granddaughter's version:

"Hey Garfield, take a Look AT my new fern I'm growing! It's only a stalk now but it will grow into a beautiful plant!", called John, watering his fern. "Oh goody!", thought Garfield who had stood back to admire his plait he had done with one of Odie's ears. "I'd rather blast off into unknown space than look at his dumb fern!" said Garfield, going up into the music room. The record player was playing tonal music. "Aaaaargh", screamed Garfield, "I came in here to have a quick nap to get my thoughts away from John's fern, not listening to old-fashioned music!" He stormed out of the room.

Odie taking action over the record player

This is my version:

Freda LATimer played in a band that specialised in mediaeval tonal music. They would give small concerts making a few pounds for their group's coffers. One day there was a fire in his garage which set light to a gas cylinder. Suddenly there was a big blast as it exploded. She had been about to go in there to transplant a stalk or two into pots to produce new plants and was relieved not to have been caught up in the fire or blast. To calm her nerves before deciding what to do about the damage, she went into the house to make a plait in her hair. She felt a lot better after that and went back to the poorly garage to see what she could salvage.

The garage explosion

1018 - SERUM

This is my 9-year-old Granddaughter's version:

"REady Garfield?," cried John," I told you to get the sandwiches ready for lunch!" He put his ear to the door of the room that Garfield had walked into and heard a snore coming from inside. John put his hands on his hips and tapped his foot impatiently with a cross expression on his face. He opened the door and managed to wake Garfield up. "I couldn't read your writing, it was to messy, and each serif was just not-readable," smiled Garfield in a sweet baby voice with his hands behind his back innocently. "EXCUSES!,", thought John. "And since when did Garfield learn what serifs are!," he thought walking out of the room. Then John had a marvellous idea. "Oh, and Garfield, since you have eaten way too much lasagne, you have caught a terrible disease called lasagnitis, therefore, you will need the serum which is, CABBAGE" called John rubbing his hands together and smiling gleefully. "Well that ought to do him some good," John said as he heard Garfield's cry of despair and the sound of him falling onto the floor.

Garfield has lasagnitis

This is my version:

ThERe was a loud snore from Katie's bedroom. "Come on lazy-bone's", said Mum, "Up you get. There's only a week left to perfect your serif skills for the calligraphy competition next Saturday." Katie groaned and stirred herself. Once she'd applied the serum to her face she felt better. She gobbled up her breakfast and shot up to her room to practice. What she produced looked beautiful. Practice during the week paid off and next Saturday she walked away with the top prize 🏆.

Katie motivated at last to work on her calligraphy

1017 - FROND

This is my 9-year-old Granddaughter's version:

Garfield was just waking up and opened his eyes. John came in and opened the curtains to let in a bright ray of sunshine. "You should really let some sunshine in here Garfield!", Garfield hissed and hid his face in the blanket. He finally got out of bed for breakfast and stared at his brown cat food. "I'm getting bored of this boring cat food", thought Garfield. He eyed around to see if anybody was watching and tipped his food out so John could trip and Garfield could gobble up the steak. John got up to get his eggs and tripped on the food. His fork fell out of his hands and each prong went with it. Garfield took his chances and jumped onto the seat to start on the steak. My daily routine, he thought. "Fine! I've lost my appetite. Let's switched on the TV instead!", barked John. John picked up his watering can and watered each frond of his freshly grown fern with care. Then Garfield, John and Odie sat in front of the TV. They flipped through the different channels. "How to drown"? NO. The baby show's "How to cronk like a goose"? NO. "When the Queen put on her crown". NO. "The noisy family"? NO. "The lasagne show"? YES. A frown fell over John's face. "Hey Garfield, do you know what happened to my lasagne I baked yesterday? I placed it on the cooking rack to cool and it seemed to have vanished!", said John, narrowing his eyes at Garfield. Garfield blushed and said while his eyes were glued to the screen, "Don't look at me like you always do, it could have been Odie for once!" John stared down at Odie who was yipping excitedly and staring at screen waiting for the show to begin. He sure did look innocent if he was the thief! John stared back at Garfield and crossed his arms. Garfield turned the other direction and mumbled, "Me, first suspect on everything, I mean it could be Odie for a change, I think we have a tattletale in this house! Unless its just that John knows I'm the lasagne lover here!"

Garfield, John and Odie watching TV

This is my version:

Finney was in a gRumpy mood, as usual. He had to get his car fixed today. The exhaust was so noisy and, to crown it all, the headlights didn't work. He had a permanent frown - oh how he wished he could drown his sorrows with a bottle of whisky. But then how could he get back home from the garage again? Nothing was right in his eyes - why had he bought a boring brown car? You would have thought he would have grown out of these moans by now, but it seemed as if moaning was what he thrived on! After he'd got the car's headlights and noisy exhaust fixed (though not the brown colour!), he drove home to do some gardening. One prong of the garden fork was bent and the neighbour's flock of geese decided to cronk and disturb the peace. (Why hadn't they got used to him by now? Maybe they sensed his grumpy mood!) One type of plant he hated was any sort of fern. Before long Finney spotted a frond from one. He attacked it with fury with the bent fork, muttering under his breath. He went back to the house as grumpy as ever.

Finney's bent prong on garden fork

1016 - TABOO

Reece hAd been senT some money by his Aunt Agatha with instructions to go and dine in her favourite restaurant (which was rather posh). The menu was a total mystery to Reece, so he asked for the waitress to choose something for him. She ordered 'pheasant under glass'. Reece was very impressed by the presentation, but the taste made him convinced the food had a taint. The waitress tried to explain that that was the way it always was and that what he'd noticed was the gamey taste. But Reece would have none of it. He ordered tapas instead. He said he was none too impressed with the tapas either, though the empty dishes suggested otherwise! Reece managed to wrangle a 30% discount because of his dissatisfaction and vowed never to return to the 'tacky' restaurant. Whenever he met up with Aunt Agatha after that, talking about 'that restaurant' was a taboo subject.

Pheasant Under Glass