Good.
The Lucky Guess
I t was after school on Monday and the playground was full of wobbly old tables with wobbly old teachers standing behind them. Me and Tilly and James had just met up with Mum and Dad by the school gates when . . .
âAGATHA AGATHA AGATHA!â
Ivy came charging over and grabbed my arm and spun me round a few times. She was a bit hyper because sheâd had a biscuit from Marthaâs mumâs tea stall, and it had got some of that same yellow icing on it that weâd put on the cake. Thereâs something in those bright colours that makes Ivy turn into . . . well, Ivy really.
âCOME ON!â she shouted and then went running off round the tables and shouting out what she thought of each one.
The first table Ivy looked at had Mrs Twelvetrees selling her raffle tickets ( âWOW!â shouted Ivy). Next to her Miss Barking was selling organic cardigans that sheâdknitted from some weird stuff she grows on her allotment (âWOW!â) .
Then there was a chair where you could sit and have your toenails painted by Motley the caretaker (WOW WOW WOWTOTALLY AWESOME WOW!â) ,and just along from that, the school receptionist Miss Wizzit was selling ânearly newâ books which had been rescued when the library had got flooded, and they were still a bit squidgy (âWOW!â) .
As you can see, the person who most impressed Judge Ivy was Motley, so he needs a big round of applause clap clap clap WOW.
âBut thatâs silly,â said Mum. âWhoâs going to be daft enough to get their toenails painted?â
Motley looked a bit hurt. âIâll do you a special offer. How about six toes for the price of five?â
âSpecial offer?â said Dad. âOoooh . . .â
In the middle of everything wasa table with a small stool standing on it. The legs of the stool were wrapped in silver tin foil to make it look posh and groovy, and sitting proudly on top was Dadâs cake. (âWOW! EH? WHAT? OH. WOW!â Thank you Ivy for that intelligent contribution.)
Pinned on the front of the stool was a smart little sign:
Guess the weight of the cake 20p
On the table beside it were some old weighing scales out of the school kitchen, and standing next to them was our class teacher Miss Pingle looking very serious. Sheâs the one who keeps dyeing her hair different colours, and on Monday it was a rather fetching shade of police-trousers blue to make herself look more official.
Miss Pingle was in charge of taking the money and writing downeverybodyâs guesses. She was desperate to do a good job because sheâs a new teacher and normally she only gets to pour out the orange squash. (By the way, it had taken her eighteen goes just to print the sign out on the computer. Of course she didnât actually tell anybody that, but earlier on me and Martha had found numbers one to seventeen scrunched up in the recycling bin. You canât fool us ha ha! )
By now Ivy was starting to calm down a bit and had reached the stage where she had to hug somebody and the nearest somebody was me. Itâs quite nice for a short time, but you donât need too much of it. Luckily Bianca saw us and came over.
âDonât worry Agatha,â said Bianca. âIvy can bug me for a hit.â
Eh? But then Bianca took Ivy off me. She must have meant to say â
hug
me for a
bit
â. YO! Good oneBianca. Top girl.
Meanwhile James had been standing over by the railings and watching a few people have a guess.
â675 grams,â said Ivyâs mum.
James had a big grin on his face so I went to ask him why. âThatâs way too small!â he told me.
Thank goodness for that. We didnât need Ivyâs mum winning the cake. Youâve just seen what one little biscuitâs worth of icing does for Ivy,so imagine what a whole cake would do. Weâd be pulling her off the moon. Wahoo â GO IVY! We love Ivy.
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