The World's Awesomest Air-Barf (10 page)

Matthew shoved the lid to one side, and Danny tipped the steaming, bubbling, seething mixture into the thick, browny-black slop. The Pongy Potion floated on the surface for a moment before the
cowpat sludge sucked it down hungrily.

Suddenly, huge bubbles began to appear, bursting with loud, sloppy pops. The barrel started to grumble loudly.

‘That sounds like Dad’s stomach after he’s had a chicken vindaloo,’ laughed Danny.

Something knocked on the inside of the wooden tub. Long ropes of sticky slime spat into the air. The grumbling turned to rumbling and the top of the liquid started to bulge upwards.

‘It’s going to blow!’ yelled Danny. ‘It
is
like Dad’s stomach after a chicken vindaloo! Run!’

The two boys charged towards the farmhouse as the cowpat barrel erupted with a ground-shaking ‘BOOOOOMMM!’.

Danny glanced over his shoulder and saw a plume of browny-greeny-yellowy-black goo rocket into the air. As it climbed higher, it spread out like a fan, casting its smelly contents far and wide,
and blotting out the sun.

The shadow of the approaching muck-cloud fell over Danny and Matthew. They nearly made it to the kitchen door, but not quite. They were just a few metres short when the Pong landed.

SPLAT!

The whole garden turned browny-greeny-yellowy-black.

Both boys had been turned into gooey gobs of greasy gloop.

‘Ace!’ said Danny, pulling a slimy old tea bag off his head.

‘Cool!’ agreed Matthew.

Grandma opened the kitchen door.

‘Oh, my days!’ she cried. ‘What’s happened?’

‘Grandad’s cowpat barrel blew up!’ answered Danny.

‘And we
stink
,’ grinned Matthew.

‘Not for long,’ replied Grandma. ‘Don’t move!’

She marched off around the side of the house, returning with the hosepipe.

‘Keep still,’ she ordered, and blasted the yucky slime off the boys.

Grandad Nobby appeared at the door. ‘How did that get up there?’ he asked, pointing to the sock that dangled drippily from the TV aerial on the roof.

Danny and Matthew glanced at each other.

‘Cats?’ suggested Danny.

‘Bats?’ suggested Matthew.

Grandad took off his old flat cap and scratched his head. He looked around at the mess that covered everything in sight. ‘We’ll have to hope it rains,’ he said.

‘Well then, we’d better do the Puddlethorpe Rain Dance,’ said Grandma, and she and Grandad set off round the garden, jigging and wailing tunelessly. Danny and Matthew joined
in, splashing in the shallow pools of dark sludge.

That evening it rained torrents.

‘Never fails,’ smiled Grandad, winking at the boys. ‘This rain’ll wash all that goo down into the ground. It’ll be good for the soil, so no harm done.’

‘There’s harm done to my nose,’ complained Grandma. ‘What a whiff!’

Danny woke early the next morning, got out of bed and opened the bedroom curtains.

He gasped.

He rubbed his eyes and looked again.

He gasped for a second time.

‘Grandad! Grandma! Matt! Get up! Come and look at this!’

Danny raced downstairs and into the kitchen. He flung open the kitchen door and stared outside. He couldn’t help it: he gasped once more.

The grass in the garden was two metres high. Buttercups, daisies and dandelions, with flowers as big as dinner-plates, stretched up above the tall green blades. Rose-bushes stood like small
trees down one side of the garden, their branches bending under the weight of enormous white blooms. Other gigantic plants crushed and crowded together nearby, with towering spikes of red and blue
flowers, huge purple bells and rafts of pink blossom.

Grandad, Grandma and Matthew joined Danny at the door.

‘Oh, my giddy aunt!’ exclaimed Grandma. ‘I’m going to need a vase as big as a milk churn for those roses.’

‘What about your vegetables, Mr B?’ asked Matthew.

‘My marrows!’ yelled Grandad. ‘Come on, let’s go and see.’

They all pulled on their wellington boots and set off like jungle explorers, pushing aside the tall leaves, treading cautiously through the high grass that rustled noisily in the breeze.

Danny glimpsed woodlice as large as saucers, and spiders bigger than Grandad’s hand, scurrying away into the shade.

All around them, but out of sight, hundreds of huge insects hummed and buzzed and clicked. Grandma moved an enormous buttercup leaf to one side, revealing a frog the size of a
football staring back at them.

Danny laughed. ‘Look at those big bulgy eyes – it looks like our teacher, Mrs Woodcock!’

‘Yeah,’ agreed Matthew. ‘And she’s got frog’s legs too!’

As they emerged from the grass and gazed over the wall of the vegetable patch, Grandad jumped in the air like he’d scored a goal.

‘My Rotting Chowhabunga!’ he cried, pointing at his treasured plant.

It was normally a small spiky clump of bright green waxy leaves. Now it was almost as tall as the boys, and rising from the centre was a thick stalk with a large dark flower-bud on the end.

‘It’s going to flower!’ said Grandad. ‘For the first time
ever
in a pot! It’s a miracle!’

Danny grinned at Matthew and winked.

‘And my marrows are massive!’ exclaimed Grandad. ‘My carrots are colossal! My lettuces are leviathans! My gooseberries are gargantuan! My parsnips are . . .’ He thought
for a moment ‘. . . pretty big!’

Grandad’s grin got wider.

‘If Ernie Slack can beat these beauties, I’ll eat my cap!’ He rubbed his hands together. ‘We’ll pick the best tomorrow morning and enter them for the competition at
the Fair.
This
year, victory will be mine!’

Dear Danny

Here’s the photo I promised you of the humongous earwig! This creature inspired my father to track down and measure the biggest bugs
from all over the world, and he donated many of his specimens to Creepy-Crawly Creek, a Wildlife Park and Home for Rescued Invertebrates at Bugsby Tyke. It’s actually not far from
Puddlethorpe, and I think
you
would love it, because it’s a record-breaking kind of place!