Phineas L. MacGuire . . . Gets Slimed! Read Online Free Page A

happened to make me change my mind:
    1. At dinner my mom told me that she and my stepdad are going away this weekend. On Friday they are going to a dinner theater that’s two hours away,and coming home Saturday afternoon. At first I thought this was a great thing, because then maybe my dad could come and take care of me and Margaret, even if Margaret is my half-sister and not even related to him. My dad treats Margaret like she’s a regular person. He doesn’t even mind that she only says about seventeen words and is obsessed with this doll she has named Trudy, whose nose she has completely chewed off.

    My dad just acts like Trudy is a regular person too.
    â€œI’m sorry, but your father can’t come this weekend,” my mom told me when I asked if Dad would take care of us. “He’s coaching the Mathletes again this year, and they’ve got a meet on Saturday.”
    â€œWe could go there,” I suggested. I love watching the Mathletes. My dad is a highschool math teacher, and the Mathletes are his best students. My dad is a great teacher, so whenever I’m around his students, they treat me like I’m the world’s most incredibly important person.
    You could get used to being treated that way, in case you were wondering.
    â€œI’m sorry, sweetie, but driving you to Dad’s would take us three hours out of our way.” My mom wiped her mouth with a Pete’s Pizza Express napkin and smiled at me. “But I’ve got very exciting news. Guess who’s going to take care of you while we’re gone?”
    â€œGrammy?”
    I wouldn’t mind if my grandmother took care of us. She’s the only adult in captivity who actually believes watching TV is good for children.
    â€œEven better! Sarah’s going to babysit!”My mother’s smile stretched two miles wide, like she’d just told me she was giving me my own chemistry lab for Christmas.
    I panicked. “Couldn’t I stay at Ben’s this weekend?” I asked.
    â€œAnd miss the fun here? No way, mister!”
    Sometimes when my mom is trying to convince you that something she wants you to do is a good idea, she gets this cheerful tone to her voice that is almost scary.
    You would think that finding out Sarah the Teenage Girl Space Alien was staying at your house for an entire twenty-four-hour stretch, possibly longer, would be bad enough. You would not need one more negative thing in your life to make your day totally rotten. Infact, you would probably feel like another bad thing was entirely impossible.
    You would be wrong.
    2. After finding out about Sarah, I needed time to recover from the bad news and come up with a plan for keeping her away. So I went to my room to count my worms.
    Counting worms is an excellent way to get your brain rolling.
    I collect dried-up earthworms. So far I have 147, which I keep in a shoe box in my closet. The longest dried-up worm I have is four inches. My goal is to find one that is at least four feet. This will be hard to do because worms shrink up when they dry. Also, I will have to move to Australia to do this, since they have the longest worms.

    I asked my mom if we could move to Australia, but she said no.
    I asked my stepdad, Lyle, if we could move to Australia, and he said maybe, and if we didn’t move there, maybe we could take a vacation there someday.
    If you have to have a stepdad, Lyle is the kind to get.
    When I got up to my room, I couldn’t find the shoe box. Usually if something gets lost in my closet, it’s because it’s gotten mixed up with a bunch of my shirts and pants, which I’m supposed to hang up, only I never do. In case you’re wondering, if you pile stuff up just right, it hardly wrinkles at all.
    I went to look for the shoe box under a pile of clothes, but all of a sudden I realized that there wasn’t a pile of clothes. All my clothes were hanging from hangers.

    All my shoes were lined up