His Hat Blew Off

This put me in mind of my grandmother. She was always telling me stories. Then she would pause dramatically. I would eagerly ask, "What happened next, Grandma?" She would reply, "I don't know. My hat blew off and I had to run and chase it."

Those two events were the inspiration for the following couple of stories.

His hat blew off, so he had to run and chase it.

His hat blew off, so his tale had to end.

His hat blew off, so he had to run and chase it.

And that's the last I saw of him.

One day, I saw a man holding his hat upon his head. He seemed to be all out of breath. I asked him, "What's the matter?"

He said, "That frisky wind plum blew my hat up and off my head and far away. I just now caught up with it." That man, his name was Fred, sat down to rest.

"Well, Fred, I'm a storyteller. I just love to hear a good story. Do you have any stories you could share with me?"

Fred said, "As a matter of fact, I do. I'll tell you about the day that this strange Blond Kid came to our house."

THE BLOND KID

When I was younger, I lived with my father, my mother, and my younger sister, Sue.

One day, my mother made my favorite dish for dinner - Spanish Rice. We had one of those new-fangled microwaves, you know, but my mother didn't really know how to use it. She cooked the dinner way too long. By the time she dished out that Spanish Rice and placed it on the table, our dinner was so hot, you could almost see the flames sprouting off our food.

My mother very wisely said, "We better go for a walk while our dinner cools." So mumbling and grumbling, off we went.

While we were gone, this Blond kid came to the house. Without even knocking on the door, she walked right in. I bet you want to know how I know what happened when I wasn't even there. It's because we had a parrot, and the parrot saw and told me the whole story, just like I'm telling it to you.

First, the Blond Kid walked up to our kitchen table. She was real hungry. She sat down at my Dad's place and took a big bite of his Spanish Rice. It was so hot she burned her tongue. She spit that food out on the table and took a big gulp of Dad's milk to cool off. Then she sat down at my mother's place and took a bite. That bite was too cold, so she spit it out on the table and took a big gulp of Mom's milk to get rid of the taste. The only problem was, the milk was warmed. That Blond Kid must have hated warmed milk, so she spit that out all over Mom's plate of Spanish Rice. She walked to my place but left it alone on account of the over-abundance of tomatoes that Mom had dished out for me. The parrot told me she muttered to herself, "Yuk! Tomatoes! I hate them!" Then she walked to Sue's place. Sue hated tomatoes too, so there was hardly any on her plate. The Blond Kid sat right down and ate up every last bite of Sue's Spanish Rice. She drank all of Sue's milk to boot.

Next, the Blond Kid walked into the living room. She didn't bother to sit on the couch or the easy chair. She went straight to Sue's little wooden chair and sat right down. Did I tell you that the Blond Kid weighed all of 300 pounds? Well, can you guess what happened to that little wooden chair? Yup, it broke all to pieces.

That Blond Kid was pretty tired by that time. She walked upstairs to take a nap. She sat down on my parents' bed but didn't like the feel of it. She tried sitting on my bed, but didn't like it either. Then she walked into Sue's room. Liking the look and feel of Sue's bed, the Blond Kid went over and laid right down. She soon was snoring away.

Well, we came home after about fifteen minutes. That Blond Kid was a fast worker. We walked up to the kitchen table and started to sit down. But Dad looked down at his plate and saw the spit-out food laying next to his plate. He saw the fork sitting on his plate and a big gulp taken from his glass of milk. Dad first said, "Gross!" Then Dad said, "Something strange is going on!"

My Mom looked down at her place that looked even worse and said, "I'll say!"

I didn't notice anything bad about my place, so I got ready to dig right in to that delicious Spanish Rice. Just then, Sue started to cry. We all looked at her plate. It was licked clean.

We decided we better search the house. We went to the living room first. Sue began to cry even harder. Her favorite little chair was smashed to smithereens.

Next, we decided to search upstairs. We didn't get all the way up before we heard a strange noise coming from one of the bedrooms. Sue quickly ran downstairs and called 9-1-1. Then she came back up to join us.

Mom and Dad looked in their bedroom. They noticed that the bedspread was all mussed up. My bad hadn't been made, so I just noticed a big old dent in my bed. Then we all walked together to Sue's room.

We heard this snoring coming from inside the room. It sounded like a freight train. We peeked inside. There was a big Blond Kid lying on Sue's bed.

We snuck downstairs and waited for the police to show up. They came and took that Blond Kid off to the police station for questioning. My family and I went out to dinner and then to K-Mart to buy Sue a new little wooden chair.

Then, uh-oh . . . .

His hat blew off, so he had to run and chase it.

His hat blew off, so his tale had to end.

His hat blew off, so he had to run and chase it.

And that's the last I saw of him.

I stood and scratched my head. "Strange, that story sounded mighty familiar. Didn't it sound that way to you?"

The next day, I went for another walk. I was kind of hoping that I'd meet up with that man again. But instead, I saw a lady holding her hat upon her head. The funny thing was, her hat looked strangely like the hat worn by the man with the hat who I'd met the day before.

The woman, her name was Sarah, invited me to sit down.

"Sarah, I'm a storyteller, and I love to hear a good story. Do you have any stories you could share with me?"

Sarah said, "As a matter of fact, I do. I'll tell you about an adventure my two cousins and I once had when we had a run-in with a wolf."

THE WOLF

Several years back, my cousins and I decided to go camping. Jack, my cousin on my Dad's side, was fourteen years old. David, my cousin on my Mom's side, was twelve years old. I, Sarah, was thirteen.

There was a place in the woods, back behind my house, where there were three caves. Each cave was within about a mile of each other. We told our respective parents that we were all going to camp together; but in reality, we planned to set up an independent camp in our own particular cave.

Jack's Dad was a farmer. So Jack bundled together a lot of hay, some food, and his camping gear. David's father was a woodcutter. So David bundled together a lot of sticks and kindling, some food, and his camping gear. My father was a bricklayer. As a good Girl Scout, I loaded up a wheel barrow with a lot of bricks, a ton of food, a first aid kit, some reading material, some flashlights, some toilet paper, some matches, and my camping gear.

We arranged to meet in the early afternoon of this one particular Saturday. Jack and David made fun of me when they saw all the stuff that I had bought. I didn't mind. I liked being prepared for any kind of emergency.

The three of us split up to go to our personal cave to set up camp.

Jack made a kind of windbreak of hay strung together along the mouth of his cave. He threw down his sleeping gear and ran off to play. David did the same with his sticks. But me, I mixed together some mud and water and built a brick wall to cover the mouth of my cave. I left a small opening that I could crawl in and out of. I wanted to do this right so that I could come camping here again sometime and have all my hard work pay off.

I finished just in time to cook dinner. Jack and David came and joined me. We ate and talked for a couple of hours. Then we went off to go to bed in our own particular cave.

Later that evening, when it was nice and dark, Jack heard a strange noise outside his cave. Then he heard a loud howling sound. It made the hair stand up on the back of his neck. He realized it was a wolf. That wolf reached out his paw and began clawing at the straw. Of course, it went flying every which way.

Jack sure was scared. He didn't have any weapons. So he took his remaining food, threw it out of the cave, and prayed. Fortunately, the wolf ran after the food. This gave Jack time to run out of his cave and make his get-away.

In the moonlit darkness, Jack ran until he got to David's cave. David let Jack in. The two of them huddled together. Soon, the same thing happened again. The wolf came. He howled. He growled. He knocked down the sticks. David and Jack threw out all the remaining food. While the wolf ate, David and Jack ran to my cave.

I heard Jack and David calling, "Help!" I pulled the bricks away that blocked the small entrance and let them in. Then I pushed them back in place, just in time before the wolf came to my cave.

We heard the wolf howl and growl. We heard him scratch and push at my brick wall. But of course, it didn't do the wolf a bit of good.

The three of us settled down to sleep. We had to stay there all night and most of the next day before the wolf finally left the premises. We then exited the cave and started home. Just when we almost got there, we . . . .

Then, uh-oh, . . .

Her hat blew off, so she had to run and chase it.

Her hat blew off, so her tale had to end.

Her hat blew off, so she had to run and chase it.

And that's the last I saw of her.

I stood and scratched my head. "Strange, that story sounded rather familiar too. Didn't it sound that way to you?"