#8 The Machine ~ part 1

Freddy fumed and fumed. He was jealous. Jealous that he wasn’t smart enough to conjure up plans the way Pit did. But Freddy was good with all things conventional.

Freddy, Pit’s neighbour used shaving cream to prevent his mirror from fogging. Pit on the hand attached windscreen wipers to his mirror instead. Who got the most publicity? Take a guess. Although Pit received more attention, it wasn’t because he was brilliant. It was because he often lived on the edge of coincidences and insanity. Still, Freddy wanted to be like him.

“I know what I’ll do,” mumbled Freddy to himself, “I’ll steal that humongous machine he has in is backyard and then I’ll be famous!”

When the clock tower struck two o’clock that night, Freddy sneaked into Pit’s backyard and dismantled the machine, brought every part to his backyard and built it back. Of course, in the dead of night, Freddy could barely see.

“Now how am I suppose to camouflage this thing,” thought Freddy, “I know, I’ll ask Pit.”

“Hello…?” said Pit in a groggy voice.

“Excuse me Pit, I want to camouflage something. Any ideas?” said Freddy

“Think superman,” with that Pit hanged up the phone on the clothes line. What a way to go on line.

Freddy pondered for a while the meaning of Pit’s words. Then, it occurred to him that superman and his everyday self were only separated by a pair of camouflage glasses. Freddy rushed into the kitchen took two glasses, filled it with water and placed it on the machine.

“There! No one would notice!” exclaimed Freddy proudly.

Little did Freddy know that Pit had horrendous memory for all things uncommon. Pit never noticed the missing machine in the backyard let alone noticed the machine in Freddy’s backyard. So Freddy went about his business trying to exploit Pit’s machine.

Freddy tinkered and tankered, hammered and dented, polished and waxed. He tried every conceivable idea as to how to get the machine to start. It wasn’t until well into the evening that he noticed the a slot for three AA batteries. He rushed over to Mr. Grocer, being a cheapskate he bought only two AAA batteries.

“It’s the same,” thought over-thrifty Freddy, “Same number of A’s.”

By the time Freddy had put in the batteries, it was already eight o’clock at night; well past his dinner time. Not knowing what button was for what, Freddy pressed everything and stood back.

...to be continued…