Neighbours (10 page)

¹
No one is sure if Merlinmary is he or she because he or she is so hairy that no one can get near enough to find out. Throughout this book Merlinmary will be referred to as ‘she' but please remember she might be he or something weird that isn't either.

²
Well, I was. I can't say how you were made. You could have been knitted for all I know.

³
My editor asked me to name the town where the Floods live, but I won't, because you might feel safe and secure knowing they don't live near you – and we wouldn't want that, would we? And if you
do
live in their town, you might start bothering them and get yourself turned into a toad, and then your parents might sue me, unless being a toad was an improvement on what you are now.

⁴
You know how sometimes you think you see something out of the corner of your eye and when you turn around there's nothing there? Well, that's one of the Floods going by. Even if you had eyes in the back of your head and didn't blink, you still wouldn't be able to see them because they travel faster than the speed of light.

⁵
And wring out the sponge into a bowl for the night eels' breakfast. (
Click here
for information about the night eels and other Flood family pets.)

⁶
Valla believed that because milkmen always get up very early, if he drank some milkman's blood for breakfast it would wake him up and get his day off to a bright start.

⁷
Which my editor said I'm not allowed to tell you about. So I'm afraid you'll just have to make up Nerlin's dream yourself.

⁸
It has to be said, though, that where Nerlin emptied Doris's litter tray, the lettuces grew two metres tall.

⁹
Click here
for instructions on how to build your own.

¹⁰
The lightning also ran up Nerlin's legs, but he quite liked that.

¹¹
This calculation is based on only 36.72% of the population using electric toothbrushes – so it could be a few years more or less.

¹²
Winchflat made himself a Beep-Loudly-When-Anyone-Else-Is-Coming Machine so he would NEVER get caught chasing red rubber balls.

¹³
Editor: ‘No one says that.'

¹⁴
Mrs Dent's favourite TV programme was
Mega-Extreme Celebrity Really Dumb Fat Ugly Stupid Idiot Loser Makeover,
where people who were dumber, fatter and even more stupid than Mrs Dent were chopped up by very, very rich doctors and turned into really thin and not-quite-as-ugly-as-before stupid idiots who couldn't believe they were still losers. It made Mrs Dent feel a lot better about herself.

¹⁵
Although, I believe you'll soon be able to buy one that tells you when you need more milk or to throw out that piece of chicken that's past its use-by date, and complains when you put things it doesn't like inside it, like dead dogs and Vegemite.

¹⁶
From www.tartytat.com, which sells over-priced stuff that makes you look really cheap. Tracylene's lipstick is called Flashy Face.

¹⁷
Another fabulous product from tartytat.com called Polyurethane Passion.

¹⁸
Which just proves that you should always let your dog sleep inside at night. You never know when a hungry vampire bat might be around.

¹⁹
Actually, the sergeant's wife understood him only too well. Their daughter Vicki had been in the same class at school as Tracylene, so Mrs LeDouche knew all about what he'd been up to.

²⁰
Mordonna's uncle, Count Septic Von Pus, had actually been buried alive as a birthday present one year and had liked it so much he had stayed buried for the next fifty years until he died. Then he was dug up and cremated.

²¹
Which is just like satellite TV, only they wouldn't have to pay for it.

²²
If you had relatives like the Dents, would you admit it?

²³
Where ALL auctioneers deserve to go.

²⁴
Click Here

²⁵
Because the Floods don't live in a castle, they keep their moat in thousands of bottles in the wine cellar.

^*
A traditional Transylvania Waters delicacy, which has caused some very ferocious arguments over whether the best lavatory lobsters come from the men's or the ladies' lavatories.

^*
And how to make a magic potion (using only spit, evaporated water and a fish eye) that makes everyone think you are so wonderful, they want to give you anything you want.

^*
Including invisible for Year 8 and over.