
It had been a week now since Henrietta had escaped from the Las Vegas Zoo and she was having a great time! Not only did she have her new turtle friends, Myrtle and Tulag, for travel companions, but she met other friends in the woods as well.
There was Bobo, the brown bear, who was a friendly as could be. They had a lot of fun down at the river, he would catch fish while Henrietta enjoyed swimming and cooling off.
She had met Caramel the rabbit, who had been the Easter Bunny a few months ago and was still hopping around feeling so proud. Caramel had introduced her to his sister Taffy. Taffy was polite to Henrietta but Henrietta got the impression that she still held a grudge towards Caramel for being the Easter Bunny. She didn’t look too happy when Caramel was talking about it with a light in his eyes. Henrietta thought that him being the Easter Bunny was so cool! She secretly wondered if there ever could be an Easter Hippo! She wanted to do something important!
Rascal the raccoon had introduced her to his family, who were all so nice. There were also so many squirrels, chipmunks and foxes that she had met. The squirrels always seemed to be in a hurry to scurry up a tree, so she didn’t talk much to them, but she often heard their friendly chatter to each other in the treetops.
This morning Henrietta had awakened early, she was excited, for they were going to travel more today. They had found a new trail that they hadn’t been on before, and wanted to see where it led.
She was munching grass on the riverbank later that morning when Myrtle and Tulag came to find her.
“Good Morning Henrietta! Are you ready for our adventure today?”
“Yes, oh yes!” she replied. “Lets go! In fact I know the perfect song to sing as we go.”
Myrtle and Tulag silently groaned. They really did like Henrietta, but …. her singing, not as much! Oh well, she was so kind and happy, that they couldn’t help but be happy with her, even if her singing caused a headache. They needed to somehow make their shells more sound proof!
They had been walking for awhile, and Henrietta had just stopped singing, so Myrtle and Tulag poked their heads out to look around. There wasn’t a cloud in the sky, a bright, sunny day. Who knew what possibilities the day may hold. Up ahead it looked like the trail may soon end. They were wondering if they would find anything exciting when Myrtle asked Tulag and Henrietta a question.
“Do you hear what I hear?” asked Myrtle.
“The peace of Henrietta not singing?” Tulag replied, as Henrietta harrumphed.
“No, listen!” said Myrtle.
They all froze for a moment, at what they heard. It was human voices, and Henrietta was afraid it was someone from the zoo looking for her. It didn’t take long though to figure out that whoever these people were, they were not from the zoo. They all sighed in relief as they continued to listen.
It was a man and a woman, and they didn’t appear to be very happy. They were clearly arguing!
“It was your idea!” the man said.
“Well she looked nice and said she needed help, excuse me, for having a heart!” the woman sharply retorted.
“So now what are we supposed to do, thanks to the dilemma that your heart got us into!” the man replied back. “We have NO money! NONE, as in zero! He stuck his hands in his jean pockets, not even any coins to rub together! I hope you don’t mind sleeping out under the sky.”
At this the young lady started to cry and the young man’s voice softened.
“Oh Jade, I am sorry. I know it wasn’t your fault.” He put his arm around her and pulled her close to him.
“We will figure something out.”, he said. “Maybe my truck will break down on her, would serve her right for stealing it and robbing us! I am just so glad that she didn’t hurt you! I can’t lose you!”
Henrietta’s eyes started to fill with tears, she felt bad for this poor couple. Then she closed her eyes, and walked off the trail to give the couple some privacy as they shared an intimate moment. It was silent, they weren’t talking anymore, their lips were busy in another way.
“We should do something?” Henrietta said to Myrtle and Tulag.
“Like what? You are a hippo and we are 2 tiny turtles, what are we supposed to do? We don’t have any money.”
“True!” said Henrietta, and they all were lost in thought.
Meanwhile not far from the woods, was a shiny blue truck on the side of the road with its hood popped open.
Tanya slammed it down with a thud! Just my luck, she thought!
She kicked at the stones along side the dirt road. A broken down truck and out in the middle of nowhere! How long would it take for another car to drive by that Tanya could flag down?
She guessed that she would have to walk to the nearest town. At least she had a wad of cash on her, she smiled at that. She had struck it right, picking a couple heading to Vegas for a honeymoon, with plenty of cash on them.
So she would be fine, she would figure things out. She always did. She might not like being stranded on this dusty road right now, but it sure beat sitting in a cell. They would learn, no one could keep Tanya locked up!
She looked around and saw a trail not too far away, looked like it headed into the woods. Ahh! She had always liked the woods, perhaps she would enjoy following the trail for a little. Take a break from being on the road. She smiled as she walked towards the woods, maybe the woods would help her clear her head, as she decided her next step.
(to be continued….)
I think Tanya’s next step will be that of Henrietta stepping on her. But if she makes it to Vegas, she should stay away from the Blackjack machines. I recently lost a whole dollar to one of those robbers.
But I doubt she’ll make it to Vegas after being stepped on by a hippo. What will really happen is that she won’t be able to move very fast, after that, and Bobo the brown bear will find she makes for a convenient lunch.
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You lost a whole dollar? Wow! That must have hurt.
Oooh Poor Tanya! But Bobo is a friendly bear!
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Not when Bobo is hungry.
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Bobo eats fish, not people! But maybe Tanya runs into the river because she is afraid of getting eaten, and then she sees Henrietta, freaks out, and tries to hide behind some logs — where the turtles, who have been sunning themselves on the logs, take the opportunity to pick Tanya’s pockets and return the cash and truck keys to their rightful owners.
AND… I definitely want to see the Henrietta the Easter Hippo story when we get close to Easter. I’ll make sure to remind you to write it! 🙂
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Oh my! Way to go Myrtle and Tulag! 🙂
Hahaha!! Oh gosh, what did I do! I guess we will see if you remember! 🙂
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That’s a very imaginative ending. I think you should start pitching in with the story writing here. Carolyn needs all the help she can get.
Is the Easter story the one where Henrietta the Easter Hippo accidentally squashes Caramel the Easter bunny, and then has a heck of a time trying to scrape that sticky Caramel off of her foot?
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OMG.
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Pick-pocket turtles. I like it.
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Like Meg said, Bobo eats fish!
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That sounds very fishy, to me.
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The young couple will discover a singing hippo in the woods and realize that they were no hallucinating from eating wild mushrooms. They will convince Henrietta to team up with them in a traveling show and they will make millions with a singing hippo.
Tanya wanders down the trail and eventually finds an enchanted cowbell that she rings and the next thing she knows she is in Africa on a wildlife preserve where she dons yet another false identity.
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Welll Henrietta did what to do something important! But you mean Myrtle and Tulag can’t go with her? So people will pay lots of money to hear a hippo sing really bad? Hmmm… Do you think they would pay a lot of money to see a kangaroo with antlers as well??
And Tanya ends up in Africa after all, what a surprise. Let me guess she meets Gilbert too?
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In my experience people often pay a lot of money to hear really bad singing.
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LOL!! Well you do have a very valid point there. Ozzy Osborne made lots of money, didn’t he? 🙂
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I wouldn’t really call that singing.
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True! Its more like a screeching sound!
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Moaning, screeching, dying cow in a hail storm… D. All of the above
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LOL!! Well said!
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LOL! 😉
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Amen to that.
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They might pay to see pick-pocket turtles, tho…
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Can you say…potential karma?
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LOL! I think you may be right. 🙂
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Aw poor couple. Those animals has the biggest heart. Yikes, so this is my first encounter with Tanya. I should hurry and click on the links you sent me.
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Animals do have big hearts. 🙂 Yes, Tanya isn’t a very nice person. I think I missed some links, so just let me know what the last one that you got is and I can check. 🙂
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The last one is Betsy’s Escape.
https://joyroses13.wordpress.com/2020/05/25/betsys-escape/
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I’m surprised you haven’t written about a turkey…it being Thanksgiving and all.
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Oops! Guess I could have thrown one in who was running away to save himself!
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That would have been cute. Tommy Turkey and his great dash to freedom.
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