Chapter 20

I apologize to the manager and promise to stay away from the MegaMart microphone. The manager encourages me to stay away from flagpoles, too. Then he promises to think about my invitation. I shake his hand and find the first aid section.

Outside the store, I place a Band-Aid across my forehead and stuff some broccoli into my backpack. Buying some of his mini dirt trees seemed to make the manager happy. Maybe I’ll offer the broccoli to Triple-H. I know I’d leave immediately if anyone offered me broccoli.

I stop at a few more houses on the way home to invite people to church. I finally give up, since the only thing people want to talk about is why I have a Band-Aid on my forehead. I wish the MegaMart had more bandage options. The giant unicorn design draws too much attention.

The good news? Only 415 to go.

I know what you’re thinking. Why don’t you just call people using that ancient “phone book” you mentioned in the second chapter? That’s a good question, and it shows you were paying attention. But it turns out that back when phone books were invented, people had phones that were attached to a wall of their house with long, curly cords on them. Crazy, right? When phone books went away, so did most of those curly corded phones, and most of those phone numbers in the book were for those curly corded phones.

Then again, maybe you weren’t thinking that at all. And maybe you weren’t paying attention. Either way, you now understand why I need to invite people in person. Besides, people really like talking to me!

At least I’m making progress on my summer goals. But I’m putting everything on hold for the moment because tomorrow my dad is taking our family to a theme park!

Now if you’ve read my other books (again, I’m not pressuring you to buy them at www.AverageBoy.org), you already know that one of my favorite places is Henry Hippo’s Pizza and Prizes—though I just call it Henry’s. It’s a great place where you can find amazing pizza and . . . wait for it, this will probably shock you—prizes!

Of course, you’ll need to bring the amazing pizza with you. That’s because Henry’s pizza tastes like ketchup on cardboard. One time I actually ate several bites of the pizza box because I couldn’t tell the difference. Plus I’m pretty sure the cheese isn’t really cheese. It’s very strong and stretchy—much too stretchy to be real food. But I might try using some to secure the walls of the tree house.

As for the prizes, those are amazing! You earn them by playing games. And boy, does Henry’s have a lot of games! Some of them even still work. After you play the games to earn tickets, you cash them in for great prizes. Once I even got a prize that didn’t break until we were in the parking lot.

Henry’s is the best! To make things even better, there’s someone dressed in a hippo costume who waddles around the place scaring little kids. So if you run out of tokens, you can run away from him for extra fun.

Anyway, Henry must be doing pretty well because he just opened a theme park. My brother Brian and I are so excited that we barely sleep the night before.

We actually wake up before our parents and pack the car. When Mom and Dad finally get in the front seat, they start the trip by going over all the rules. Because who doesn’t want to start an exciting trip without listening to a long lecture first?

Dad’s worried about us staying connected at the park, so he gives us all walkie-talkies. Henry’s theme park is in an area where the cell phone service is pretty spotty. The walkie-talkies will help us stay in contact with each other in case one of us gets lost. Actually, Dad’s exact words are “When Bob gets lost.”

As we pull out of the driveway, I decide to test my walkie-talkie:

Breaker, breaker, this is Big Bob. What’s your location, Proud Papa? Over and out.

“I’m right in front of you,” Dad says. “Now please stop bothering me while I’m driving.”

He doesn’t even use the walkie-talkie. Why have one if you’re not going to use it? I also see my walkie-talkie has a red button on the side. I decide to check that out too.

Waahhh! Weewooo!

Quick lesson: If you ever get your own walkie-talkie, do not press the red button! It makes a loud siren noise. Evidently, it can also cause fathers to swerve all over the road. This trip is not off to a great start. To help lighten the mood, I start a conversation about why we shouldn’t wake up so early for every family trip—only the fun ones, like today.

My dad suggests that every family trip is fun. I counter his suggestion by reminding him of our “history” vacations, where all we seem to do is drive and look at different fields. After an hour of Dad explaining the importance of history, we pull into the parking lot at Henry’s Pizza and Amusement Park.

Dad pays $120 for four tickets and an additional $20 to park. That’s a lot of money, but we can go on all the rides as many times as we want! There are ten rides to choose from . . . well, actually just eight. Coincidentally, the two rides that aren’t open yet are both named “Under Construction.”

I pull out my phone. I don’t have any cell service, but I want to take a photo of my family. I decide to wait until my dad stops frowning. He still has his wallet out and is glaring at the receipt.

Mom gets us all together for the photo and forces Dad to smile. Then she suggests we ride the train first.

The train is a thirty-minute ride around the theme park. It likely would have been more fun if we hadn’t just been in the car for over an hour. Evidently, it’s designed to eat up time that could’ve been used for riding faster, funner rides. It also holds us captive while the theme park fills up with people.

Once we’re off the train and have time to yawn appropriately, my younger brother starts begging to ride the big roller coaster. He can be so annoying sometimes.

“Bob wants me to say that I want to do the roller coaster next!” Brian exclaims. “And he won’t give me back my walkie-talkie until I do.”

Like I said, my brother can be so annoying. Yet my parents agree with his suggestion, so we start walking toward the craziest ride in all the park.