The whole family sat on the back verandah drinking warm blood slurpies as the ice-cold moon rose over the trees and cast its peaceful light over the two fresh graves.
‘Listen to that,’ said Mordonna.
‘What? I can’t hear anything,’ said Nerlin.
‘Exactly.’
Life, at last, was perfect.
FOOTNOTES
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.
You will need:
1 dead person to revive.
10 dead people to practise on.
1 Krankovich 476B Portable Nuclear Reactor.
17 metres of big copper wire with bright red insulation.
1 colossal power source – eg. the sun or Merlinmary.
Strong glue – sometimes the skull can burst open.
Heavy-duty rubber gloves and boots.
Goggles – in case of flying toes.
Blood spurting out of the dead person’s nose is an unavoidable side-effect. Some people think this is a bonus.
The dead person’s pyjamas nearly always catch fire. (Bloody good thing too.)
How to get blood out of a white sheet
Pour lukewarm water through the stain into a china cup. Makes an excellent bedtime drink. Don’t use boiling water as that will cook the blood, which is just disgusting.
How to get blood out of a sleeping human
Place your fangs on the jugular vein, press slowly and suck very quietly. Goes well with barbecued rat.
How to get blood out of a sleeping bank manager
Don’t be ridiculous!
How to get blood into a sleeping bank manager
Why would you want to waste perfectly good blood?
How to make ‘I Can’t Believe It’s Not Blood’
This recipe has been in Granny Flood’s family for three hundred years and is a firm favourite at Christmas, when it is used instead of custard.
You will need:
• Two large bottles of tomato ketchup.
• 500 grams of black slugs.
• 3 tablespoons of black enamel paint.
• The end of your right thumb.
Put all the ingredients in a blender, cover your face and blend on high speed until smooth. Add chilli powder and saliva to taste.
Pour over Christmas pudding, small dogs or your own head, depending on the time of day.
Garnish with nose-hair clippings.
(Also goes well with lavatory lobsters.*)
FLOODS 2: PLAYSCHOOL
In The Floods book 2 – Playschool – is everything you ever wanted to know about wizard school, and lots of stuff you never even though of. This is not the cissy place that Potter boy goes to, but Quicklime College, a proper wizard and witch school far away in the deepest mountains of Patagonia. They don’t waste their time playing baby games on broomsticks here. They learn useful, important things, like how to turn people into slugs and how to steal valuable jewels and gold from impenetrable castles.*
Smiling.
How to make tea.
How to kick a ball around in a field of mud with 21 other people.
How to juggle three tennis balls.
Welsh.
Beige.
Scowling.
How to make warts.
How to kick a massive lump of dinosaur gristle around in a field of mud with 13 other people.
How to juggle three tennis players. Seriously powerful magic.*
Time travel.
Time travel.
THE FLOODS
HOW TO LIVE FOREVER
Random House
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Neighbours Page 7