1 - A Lot of Nothing
At that he turned to me and asked, “How many Bangles in a Twiddle-twaddle Tree?”
“17 as the crow flies,” I answered, remembering my days in the Puddle School of Everything. Satisfied with my answer, he took me by the dauble of my jacket and led me to a huge Nothing-Vat which, as usual, was full of Nothing.
“Do you know what this is?” he asked me with a pembulant wave of his hand.
“Yes,” I said, feeling proud to have had the experience, trivial as it might be.
“Do you know what it’s for?” He looked at me seriously. He had me there for I hadn’t the slightest idea. “It’s for Nothing, of course!” he exclaimed. “And it’s good for nothing!” He glared at me with flaring nostrils. I felt utterly ridiculous.
“Uh, where did you get all that Nothing?” I asked.
“Oh, from Nowhere in Particular, but it seems that is the most Nothing we can have, for even if we add two or three times as much, we still end up with the same amount of Nothing.”
“Can’t you add something to the Nothing to make the Nothing multiply?” I queried.
“Well, we’ve tried adding other things, but no matter what we add, it always turns out to be something else being multiplied instead!!”
By now he had me quite confused, so I tried to change the subject. “Uh, have you changed the culoform in the ballast-kettle yet?” I asked him while he caught his breath.
“No, no, glad you reminded me. It seems you do have Something in that vacuum between your ears!”
I could not understand what he meant by a vacuum being between my ears, not being able to picture a vacuum with Something in it. All logic told me that it then no-longer would be a vacuum. I was about to ask him about this point, when suddenly he leaped into the air onto a Froodle Bush.
“He appeared to be in great despair. “Why, oh why are we so limited?” he asked.
“Limited how?” I answered, willing to be of assistance.
“In climbing!! Why are we limited to climbing either up or down and not allowed to climb in any other way?!”
He started to cry. I wanted to do something but I wasn’t sure what I could do. “Come on down from there,” I said. He was blubbering like a child. He jumped down.
“I want to go for a short walk,” he told me, still wiping his eyes.
“Alright, I’m just glad you don’t like tall walks or we might never get it back.”
“Don’t worry,” he said. “I’ll bring along a crowbar.”
And so, we were both off to take a walk, and soon disappeared in a krumple of Toad-willows.
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