Wednesday 6 July 2016

Ughtah the giant

Ughtah is a big guy. He has big feet, a big voice and a big heart.
When Ughtah enters a room he has to duck so that he doesn't bang his head on the top of the door frame.
When Ughtah sits down, he takes up two-thirds of his sofa. You can’t see what is behind Ughtah without running round him.
Ughtah never shouts at anybody and he gets upset when people shout at him. What he doesn’t know is that people shout at him because he so tall that they think he won't hear them if they don’t shout. Ughtah so tall and round that he does not always know where a voice is coming from, either. This makes life difficult for Ughtah because he never knows who is not angry with him and who is not hiding behind him.
Ughtah likes to go for walks in the woods, but only when the sun is shining and the birds are singing. On sunny days Ughtah thinks the sun is shining especially for him so he says a loud THANK YOU to the sun.
Ughtah likes the woods because the trees are even taller than him so he does not feel like a giant. When he stands beside some of the trees, he feels very tiny.
In the summer, the trees are dressed in leaves that rustled in the breeze. Ughtah thinks the trees are waving to him, so he waves back.
When the birds see Ughtah, they sing special songs for him. The bird song that Ughtah likes most is that of the cuckoo. He sings Ugh-tah, Ugh-tah. The other birds do not like their fat feathered friend. They sing tunes like Ugh-ugh-ugh-ugh-tah, or Ugh-tah-ugh-tah-tah, or tah-tah-tah-tah-tah-tah-ugh.
In winter Ughtah does not enjoy his walks as much. The leaves on the trees have turned red and yellow and fallen off, leaving the branches bare. Most of the birds who sing for Ughtah have taken holidays in warmer places, and the wind often howls as if it is angry with Ughtah.
So instead of going for walks in the woods, Ughtah listens to symphonies. His favourite symphony is by a guy called Beethoven and goes Ugh-tah-tah-tah, Ugh-tah-tah-tah. Ughtah likes to sing along with Beethoven’s 5th symphony,  but sometimes he plays his own music on his old upright piano. One of his favourite tunes  is the “Flea Waltz”. It goes Diddle-ugh-tah-tah, Diddle-ugh-tah-tah, Diddle-ugh-tah-ugh-tah-ugh-tah-tah.
Ughtah likes to play piano duets with his friend whose name is Diddle. They play scales that go Did-dle Did-dle Did-dle Did-dle-tah and the Flea Waltz fourhanded, and Diddle, who is very short and has very small feet, but a big heart like Ughtah's, but not quite as big, winds his revolving piano stool as high as it will go and sings along to the piano-playing.
When they have finished making music, they drink lemonade and eat fruit. Piano-playing makes you thirsty and hungry, Ughtah says. If they are very hungry – and they always are - they go into the kitchen to eat the donuts someone Diddle knows bakes secretly for Ughtah every day. They eat them all up to the last sticky mouthful, leaving nothing on the plate.
You always know when Ughtah and Diddle have been eating donuts because they have a ring of icing sugar around their mouths and the donut plate is empty. Diddle says that the rings in the donuts have transferred themselves to their mouths, but Ughtah is not very good at thinking deeply about things, so he  only laughs at what Diddle is saying, thinking it must be a joke.
One day, Ughtah said to Diddle “We're getting fatter and fatter on these donuts. We must find out who makes them and ask them not to make as many.”
“We? Don’t you mean you?” said Diddle.
The problem is that while Diddle stays the same and can get through any door, Ughtah now not only has to bend over to avoid the top of a door, but also has to squeeze himself through the door opening with a push from Diddle that ends with a plop as Ughtah arrives on the other side.
“You are getting very fat, too, my friend,” Ughtah said, mainly because he would prefer to have a fat friend who did not tell him that he was fat.
Diddle does not like to be told he is getting fatter because it is not true. He says the donuts are too big.
“If the donuts are half as big, twice as many will fit on the plate,” Ughtah argues, “so I will eat twice as many to make the plate empty.”
“But three small donuts are less food than three large donuts,” Diddle argues. “If you want to get through doors, you should eat small donuts and it doesn’t matter how many are left over.”
But Diddle was not being fair. He had decided that when Ughtah had eaten three small donuts next day, he could eat all the others, but he did not tell Ughtah about this solution to the problem of what to do with the 6 left-over donuts.
There were normally 6 big donuts on the plate. Diddle was good at counting. He and Ughtah each normally ate 3 big donuts each. But if the donuts were small and Ughtah ate 3 as usual, there would be 9 donuts left over. Ughtah was not good at counting, so he would not notice, Diddle decided.
Ughtah finally agreed  to eat smaller donuts. Diddle knew that the donuts came from the baker’s shop called ‘Angel's Cakes and Donuts’. The sales assistant, whose foreign-sounding name was Crogski Ailkens because she was foreign person, liked Ughtah and Diddle, which is why she baked the donuts for them every day.
Crogski was a head taller than Diddle, which did not mean that she had two heads; it just meant that the rest of her was not as short. Crogski was at least two heads shorter than Ughtah, but that did not mean she had no head; it just meant that the rest of her was not as long.
"I think I'll take a holiday from work,"  said Ughtah’s girlfriend Eckerlie one day. "I want to see what you are eating, Ughtah. I don't want you to roll up the aisle when we get married."
Eckerlie thought she would marry Ughtah one day. Marriage was not something Ughtah thought about, so he asked his is girlfriend Eckerlie why he would even think of rolling up the aisle with anyone.
Eckerlie was forced to admit that Ughtah was not very bright.
“I’m going on holiday, Ughtah. When I come back I expect you to be half as fat as you are now.”
"That’s a good idea, Eckerlie," replied Ughtah, thinking of all the donuts he ate every day. “But you will go to work every day, won’t you?”
Eckerlie’s brain-cells were now working overtime. She was trying to understand why Ughtah wanted her out of the house all day.
“I could stay at home and spend my holiday in the garden,” she said.
"But we need the money, Eckerlie." said Ughtah, now worried that she would see the donuts. “You must carry on working.”
“If you worked every day, you would not be as fat,” said Eckerlie.
“If I worked all day, I would hate it,” said Ughtah.
You’ve guessed. Ughtah is not an all-the-year-round worker. In fact, he only ever works when the circus comes to town. Then he paints his own nose red to match the red nose mask with the spectacles that hook over his ears. He paints his face white with one big black tear rolling down his cheek. Ughtah squeezes himself into his clown constume, although it has grown smaller since the previous year. He puts on his hat with the wobbly flower on a spring and entertains the audience in the circus tent.
“Here comes Roly-Poly!” the circus manager announces, Ughtah rolls down a long ramp into the circus manege and the audience shouts and cheers.
Ughtah performs his clown act to music played by Diddle. Eckerlie stands by in case of emergency, though she does not quite know what an emergency looks like. It could be something to do with the large safety-pins she has pinned to her Red Cross uniform. If Ughtah should burst out of his costume she would be there to pin him in again.
A week later Eckerlie started her holiday. She sat in the garden and did crosswords or read a book. Ughtah did not realise that Eckerlie was also watching the kitchen through a car mirror screwed onto the deck-chair. The kitchen door was fortunately open, so Eckerlie did not miss anything.
While Ughtah and Diddle were playing duets on the piano, Crogski crept silently into the garden and into the kitchen. She was carrying a plate. On the plate were 12 half-sized donuts covered in icing suger.
Eckerlie did not say anything. She got out of her deck-chair and went into the kitchen.
Eckerlie felt very hungry when she saw the donuts.
“I’ll just have one,” she said to herself. “Nobody will notice. There are so many.”
Eckerlie enjoyed the donut so much that she ate another, and another, until there were only 6 left on the plate. Then she went back into the garden and had a sleep.
While she was sleeping, Ughtah and Diddle finished their music-making, their lemonade and their fruit and came into the kitchen to eat the donuts.
“Somebody had eaten half the donuts,” said Diddle.
“No they haven’t,” said Ughtah. “There are 6 on the plate. There are always 6 donuts on the plate.”
“But I ordered 12,” said Diddle, now very puzzled.
“We only eat 6, Diddle,” said Ughtah. “Why did you order 12? Didn’t we say that we were going to eat smaller donuts, not more donuts?”
“These are smaller,” said Diddle.
“But I only eat 3 and you only eat 3, so there are enough donuts for both of us.”
“But there should be 12 donuts on the plate.”
“What have you done with the others then,” said Ughtah. “We were playing the piano when the donuts came.
“I haven’t done anything with them, Ughtah. They have disappeared.”
The two musicians ate the small donuts and went for a walk in the park.
Next day the same thing happened. Ughtah and Diddle played the piano; Eckerlie sat in the garden; Crogski brought the donuts and left; Eckerlie ate 6; the musicians came to get their donuts and 6 had gone. Every day for a week the same thing happened.
On Saturday Diddle went to the baker’s shop and asked Crogski why she was only bringing 6 donuts.
“I brought 12 every day,” Crogski said.
“But there were only ever 6 on the plate,” said Diddle.
“Somebody must  have eaten them while you were not looking, Diddle,” said Crogski. She was quite angry that someone who was not Diddle or Ughtah had taken the donuts.
“I think you’ll have to guard your donuts, Diddle,” said Crogski.
Diddle told Ughtah what Crogski had said and they decided to spy on the donut thief.
Next day they played a recording of piano music and hid behind a door from where they could see the kitchen table.
Crogski brought the 12 donuts and left. Then something happened that made Ughtah and Diddle rub their eyes in disbelief.
Eckerlie, who had told Ughtah he was fat,  came into the kitchen and gobbled up 6 of the donuts before going back into the garden.
“What shall we do now?” said Ughtah.
“We’ll challenge her,” said Diddle.
“How?”
“Follow me!” said Diddle.
He led the way to Eckerlie’s deck-chair. She had her eyes closed and was enjoying the sunshine.
“Hey you,” shouted Diddle, making Eckerlie and Ughtah jump. “Where are my donuts?”
“They are on the plate,” said Eckerlie.
“I mean where are the 6 donuts that should also be on the plate?” said Diddle.
“I don’t know,” said Eckerlie.
“You are telling an untruth, Eckerlie,” said Diddle.
“Don’t say that to Eckerlie,” said Ughtah. “She doesn’t know anything about the donuts.”
“Oh yes she does,” said Diddle, looking closely at Eckerlie. “Look at the icing sugar all round her mouth.“
Ughtah looked.
“You’re right, Diddle,” he said.
“Did you eat all those donuts last week and today?” Diddle asked. “The evidence that you did is very strong.”
“Did you, Eckerlie? If so, I’m disappointed in you,” said Ughtah.
Eckerlie was ashamed. She picked up her book and went home.
Diddle ordered 6 big donuts for the following day.
Ughtah said he was not going to roll down the aisle with Eckerlie for all the donuts in the world.


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