Tag: threelittlepigs

The Three Little Pigs Go to Grandma’s House

Posted on by

Once upon a time there were three little piglets who often got into trouble because they didn’t do what they were told. They liked to play tricks on the other animals, and so their mom dressed them in bright red cloaks to warn others they were coming. There were many of their neighbors who appreciated the warning.

One day, they were racing around the house climbing on furniture and yelling loudly. Their mother, tired of scolding them, called them into the kitchen. She gave them each a treat and handed them a basket to take to their grandmother’s house on the other side of the forest. “Make sure she reads the note inside,” she added.

“What does it say?” the oldest pig asked.

“It says that you are allowed to spend the night, and there are cookies for you all to share for after dinner. Leave them be, and don’t talk to strangers.”

The little pigs, thrilled with the idea of an adventure, easily agreed. They put on their bright red cloaks and made the youngest pig carry the heavy basket. They set out, too excited about the road ahead to even remember to look back and wave goodbye to their mother.

She was not surprised, but waved goodbye until they were out of sight anyway.

The youngest piglet was soon complaining about the weight of the basket. “Why do I have to carry it?” he asked. “You are both older and stronger. I shouldn’t have to carry it at all.”

“We’re older, so we’re in charge,” said the oldest piglet. “Besides, I need to have my hands free to fight off pirates. See, I’ve already found a good stick to use as a sword.”

“Maybe we could take turns,” the middle piglet said. “I’ll carry it on the way home.”

“But it will be empty then. That’s not fair!” The youngest piglet began to squeal in anger, but then he paused. “It would be lighter if we ate some of the cookies now.”

“There isn’t much difference between eating them now or later,” the oldest pig agreed.

“They’re our cookies, and we can eat them when we want to. They’ll be better now when we’re hungry than after dinner when we’re full,” the middle pig said.

The three little pigs opened the basket and ate every cookie, leaving none for their grandmother. At the bottom of the box there was a note. The oldest pig read it out loud to his brothers:

“Here are some cookies for after dinner. Thank you for agreeing to keep the boys for the night.”

The oldest pig let pulled a pen from the pocket of his cloak. “I’ll just cross out ‘here are’ and write ‘we need’, and we’ll have cookies for the walk home tomorrow.” The younger piglets cheered. Feeling full of goodwill, he passed the empty basket to the middle pig to carry, and they continued on their way.

Further on the path, they met a wolf. He smiled sharply and complimented their cloaks. Figuring that meant he was a good guy and not a pirate, they stopped to talk. “Where are you going?” the wolf asked.

“To grandma’s house,” the youngest pig said.

“Where does she live?”

“Three miles south in a large cave,” the middle pig said. This was not true, but the little pigs liked to play tricks on people.

While the others were describing the imaginary cave, the oldest pig pulled a small bottle of dye from a pocket in his cloak and poured it all over the wolf’s bushy tail. The wolf didn’t notice, and soon darted off into the underbrush.

The three little pigs laughed and continued their journey to their grandmother’s house. The squirrels and rabbits darted away at their approach, and so they didn’t get another chance to play any tricks or talk to strangers. They smacked the underbrush with their stick-swords and pretended to see pirates instead. It took them quite a while to arrive at the little brick cottage on the other side of the forest.

The youngest pig, once again holding the basket, handed it to his grandmother without any explanation. She brushed crumbs off the note and read it with a sigh. “You ate the cookies on the way here, didn’t you?”

The oldest pig frowned. “Didn’t you read the note? Mom said to make sure you read it.”

His grandmother raised an eyebrow and looked at him and then his brothers. The youngest hunched his shoulders. “They were for us anyway. We were hungry. It was a long walk, and they made me carry the basket almost the whole way,” he whined. The older piglets scowled at him, but it was too late.

“I think you don’t need anymore sweets tonight then,” their grandmother said. She sent them to go play while she finished bringing in the laundry. When she found them less than an hour later, they were cutting up her wool caps to make pirate beards and scrawling funny faces on the mirrors with marker. She wasn’t sure where they’d found the scissors or the markers.

She gave them rags to wash the mirrors and went to start dinner. When she opened the cupboards to make dinner and had a bowl of flour fall on her head, she called the little pigs in and scolded them. She fed them oatmeal for dinner and sent them to bed early for breaking so many rules. Consequently, they missed all the excitement that happened next.

Over a breakfast of leftover oatmeal, their grandmother told them a strange story of a wolf who visited late in the evening, demanding to be let in or he’d blow the house down.

“With dynamite?” the middle pig asked, looking interested.

“No, by breathing on it,” his grandmother said.

The older two piglets laughed. The youngest looked confused. “But this is a brick house. That wouldn’t work.”

“Of course not,” the oldest piglet said. “He didn’t know anything about anything.”

The youngest pig shrugged and turned back to their grandmother. “What did you do?”

“A local woodsman passed by and chased him away. He said the wolf had an oddly colored tail so he’d recognize it if he saw it again, and he’d keep an eye out for it.”

The three little piglets looked at each other and didn’t say anything.

The grandmother set the piglets to clearing the table and washing and drying the dishes. She gave them each a treat, and then she insisted they put on their red cloaks. She handed the basket to the oldest piglet. “You will take turns holding the basket, and you will not look inside until you get home. Make sure your mom reads the note, and do not talk to strangers.”

When they got home, the youngest piglet handed their mom a basket empty except for a note covered in crumbs. She read the note and sighed. Then she asked them about their visit to see their grandmother. They talked about oatmeal and early bedtimes and didn’t mention the cookies or the wolf or pirate beards or markers or flour at all.

Their mother somehow knew about it anyway. She scolded them for breaking rules, hugged them, and after an evening of their pranks she gave them cabbage soup for dinner and an early bedtime. The next morning they woke up early, well-rested and ready for a new adventure. Their mother made sure they wore their red cloaks to give the neighbors plenty of warning. The little piglets made sure to fill the pockets with useful things.

They lived happily ever after.

Brothers in Time

Posted on by

Once upon a time, far in the future, three brothers set out to seek their fortune. Fortunately for them, their father was a brilliant, yet somewhat mad, inventor. So he gave each of them a time machine as they set out on their adventure.

The youngest brother decided to live in a tropical climate before people invented the wheel or fire or tools. He decided that would give him plenty to impress the people with, and life would be easy. And it was, for a time.

Unfortunately, before long, someone came knocking on his door. “We’re the time guardians, let us in,” a deep voice said.

“There’s no such thing,” the youngest brother replied.

“We’re from the future, sent to fix past events that were messed up by unregulated time travel,” the voice said.

“If you’re from my future, shouldn’t you leave me alone as part of the past?” the brother threw his things into a bag and grabbed his time machine.

“Let us in, and we’ll talk about it,” the voice said. The door creaked as it began to open.

The youngest brother grabbed his time machine and set it to home in on his brothers. It took him to the nearest one, the middle brother. He was living in Renaissance Italy.

When the youngest brother arrived, the middle brother was in the middle of a discussion with a number of important scholars. The youngest brother hid until they left, and then he hurried into the house. “Brother, guess what?”

“What are you doing here?” the middle brother asked, looking annoyed.

“There are time guardians from the future trying to stop us from changing anything in the past.” The youngest brother looked around. “Hey, are you going to eat that? I missed bread more than I thought I would.”

The middle brother passed him the loaf, looking thoughtful. “Time guardians? Are you sure?”

The youngest brother nodded. “They said they were from our future.”

“If they’re from our future, shouldn’t they leave us alone as part of the past?”

“That’s what I said!” The youngest brother looked out the window. “Hey, are you expecting company?”

“No, why?”

The youngest brother pointed. “There’s a group of people headed this way. Oh, here they are.”

Someone knocked on the door. “We’re the time guardians, let us in,” a deep voice said.

“There’s no such thing,” the middle brother said. He quickly packed a bag and grabbed his time machine. He looked at the youngest brother, who was already setting the machine to jump to their oldest brother.

“We’re from the future –” the voice began, but the brothers left before they could hear the end of the sentence.

The youngest brother was still holding the loaf of bread. He chewed on it as he looked around. “Where are we?”

“Moon Base Alpha,” the oldest brother said, stepping away from the sink and wiping his hands on his coveralls. “They needed a permanent maintenance worker, and I was familiar enough with the technology to impress them. I got the job.”

“But didn’t they abandon that base when the funding ran out?” the middle brother asked.

“Yes, and it was self-sustaining,” the oldest brother said. “I think I can make a case for staying on and maintaining things if I volunteer my time for room and board.”

“But won’t you get lonely?” the youngest brother asked.

“Video chats. Plus, they’ll develop teleporters soon enough. If the base is in good working order, maybe they’ll select it as a tourist site or a historical monument.” The oldest brother shrugged. “I thought it was worth the risk.”

“Do they need any more maintenance workers?” the middle brother asked. “We need a place to hide from the time guardians.”

“There’s no such thing,” the oldest brother said.

“Yes there is. They’re from our future,” the youngest brother said. “They want us to stop messing with the past.”

“If they’re from our future, shouldn’t they leave us alone as part of the past?”

“That’s what I said,” the youngest and middle brothers said together.

The oldest brother sighed. “Tell me what you know.”

The other two brothers shrugged. “That’s pretty much it,” the youngest brother admitted.

“You didn’t stay and talk to them? Of course you didn’t.” The oldest brother shook his head.

Just then, someone knocked on the door. “We’re the time guardians, let us in,” a deep voice said.

“Coming,” said the oldest brother. He let them in.

The men in spacesuits took off their helmets after they came through the air locks. They sat down on the chairs in the lobby of the station across from the three brothers. “We’re from the future,” one of the men began in a deep voice.

“And you don’t want us to change the past,” the youngest brother said.

“That’s right,” the man said.

“What about maintaining it?” the oldest brother asked. “Can we get permission for that? Or research? There must be some way that we can use our time machines without hurting the past or the future.”

“Of course there is,” the man said. “Let me give you some of the paperwork with the rules you need to follow. If you are willing to agree to the rules, and come to the future for some training, we would be happy to allow you to continue to use your time machines.”

And so the brothers read the rules and went to the training. The youngest brother joined the time guardians. The middle brother became a historian. The oldest brother continued to live on the moon. And they all lived happily long before they were born.

The end.

The Three Little Colonies

Posted on by

Once upon a time, there was an advanced civilization that was living in a solar system that circled a very old star. The failing star was growing too large, and the solar system was no longer a nice place to live.

So, the civilization packed itself into three large ships and left to seek its fortune in the wide, wide galaxy. They traveled together as much as they could, but each ship was under the direction of its own captain with their own ideas of what to look for in a new home. Finally the time came where they went their separate ways.

The first ship decided to stop at a planet that already had a lovely atmosphere. There was lots of clean water and plants growing. The natives were small and easily overlooked. All that was required to settle down was to land the ship and open the doors. They didn’t even build separate structures to live in for years and years.

The second ship found a pleasant little planet to settle on. It was a little close to the star it orbited, but that just meant that it stayed nice and warm. It didn’t have much atmosphere, but that was easily fixed with a little work. After that it was a matter of adding the necessary water and plant life. They built some simple structures and settled in after a decade or so of hard work.

The last ship searched and searched. They finally found a menacing gas giant. “Perfect,” the captain said. “We’ll certainly be safe here.”

They were indeed safe, but it took decades to build structures that would sustain the colony as they grew into their new home. It wasn’t easy, but they were thinking long-term. In the end, they built a beautiful home that would protect the colony as it grew, hidden in the swirling storms of their new planet.

And then one day, a thousand years into the future, a war-like civilization sent out ships to find new places and people to conquer. It didn’t take them long to check the planet with the lovely atmosphere. When the people living there looked into the sky and saw the invading ships, they ran to their initial transport vessel and locked themselves in.

The invading aliens hailed the ship. Their picture showed up on the view screen. They had sharp teeth and long claws and leathery skin. They were terrifying. “Little friends,” the captain said, smiling falsely. “Won’t you let us come in?”

The captain surreptitiously pulled some wires out of place in the main console. “I’m sorry,” he said politely. “The doors are broken. See?” He pushed some buttons. “They don’t work. I guess we’re stuck.”

“Oh don’t worry,” the invading captain said, just as politely. “We have a laser cannon. We’ll just blast down the door and let you out.”

They both cut the connection on their view screens. The people on the transport ship teleported to the nearest sister-ship and set their ship to self-destruct before they left. They ended up on the pleasantly warm little planet with the new atmosphere and settled in quickly with their long-lost relatives.

The invaders saw the self-destruct countdown in time to quickly exit the ship, but not in time to counter it. They approached the blast crater with sour looks on their lizard-like faces. “We can send home for some settlers, but we’d have to build from scratch. The lazy laggards who settled here did almost nothing, and they didn’t even leave behind any workers to do the work for us under our kind supervision.”

And so the invaders left behind settlers of their own and continued searching the galaxy for worlds to conquer. All too soon, they found the pleasantly warm planet and prepared to attack. Meanwhile, the citizens of the planet fled to their transport ship and locked themselves inside.

“Little friends,” the invading captain said and smiled wide, showing his sharp teeth. “Won’t you let us come in?”

The captain begin scribbling frantically, just out of sight of the screen. “I’m sorry,” he said politely and held up the scribbled note. “It says here that visiting hours are from noon to four, and you’ve just missed it. Perhaps you can come back another day or find someone else to visit.”

The invading captain smiled even wider. “But we’ve come all this way. We simply must come in,” he said politely. “Don’t get up. We have a laser cannon. We’ll just blast down the door and let ourselves in.”

They cut the connection and the citizens in the transport ship teleported themselves to the last remaining sister ship. They, of course, set their ship to self-destruct before they left.

Looking into a second blast crater, the invading captain growled. “Once could be overlooked,” he said at last, “But twice is unforgivable. We will find them, and then they will be truly sorry.”

Using the best of their tracking abilities, the invaders finally found themselves outside an inhospitable gas giant. The pilot looked at the gas giant. “Are we really going in there?”

“Hail them from here,” the captain said. The view screen crackled, but there was a tenuous connection. “Little friends,” the captain said with a grin. “Won’t you let us come in?”

The audio crackled, but there was no reply.

“Get the laser cannon ready,” the captain said. “We’ll just blast down the doors.”

But after flying through frightening storms for hours without seeing any doors, the crew became mutinous. “I don’t think there’s anyone really here,” someone grumbled at the back of the flight deck. “They must have passed close enough to confuse our sensors and hide their trail. We’ve lost them.”

In the end, the captain had to agree that they were probably right. They left to conquer other worlds. Thousands of years later, their home world would be hit by a meteor that would wipe out their civilization, leaving the colonies independent as the home world suffered through an ice age that lasted for millions of years.

And the three colonies living on the gas giant, reunited at last, lived there happily ever after. They are probably living there still. Who knows? It’s not like it’s easy to go check.

The end.

 

The Fourth Little Pig

Posted on by

Once upon a time, there were four little pigs. I’m sure that you were told that there were only three. Don’t feel bad. Everyone makes that mistake. Perhaps you will understand why after reading this story.

It begins just like the story you have heard so many times before. Little pigs set out to seek their fortune and build themselves homes, each possessing various levels of patience and common sense.

The first pig buys straw bales and makes a house-shaped structure. Perhaps he’s clever enough to look up modern construction methods and use the straw bales for insulation, plastering the straw bales inside and out to prevent mold and decay, and building overhanging eaves to keep the rain out. Perhaps he didn’t. In any case, the story says he finished building rather quickly.

The second pig built with timber. Was it a rough log cabin or something more modern? Did he use durable wood and treat it to protect it from moisture and pests? The story doesn’t say. Pig number two also finished building rather quickly.

The third pig buys brick. It takes him a long time to build a sturdy home. I assume every necessary protection was in place, although apparently his chimney was large enough for a full-grown wolf to crawl inside. This implies that he neglected a chimney cap or that it wasn’t securely fastened in place. He was lucky that flying embers didn’t ignite a house fire before the wolf arrived.

And the fourth pig? Well, I’m sure you can guess. Each pig in this story spends more time building his house and making it more secure. The fourth pig was no exception. He built a castle from stone, surrounded it with a moat, and hired squirrels as archers.

The castle keep was large enough to house and protect many small animals and their families. In exchange for the promise of shelter, they shared guard duties during the construction process. The wolf didn’t stand a chance, and he knew it. He stayed well out of range of the squirrel archers and visited the other three pigs instead.

Their story continued much as you know it. He came, blew down their houses with magical wolf breath or a portable jet engine or a wrecking ball that didn’t work on brick. The three pigs made their final stand in the third pig’s house and won against the wolf.

And the fourth pig learned about the whole mess from their Christmas newsletter. He complained to a nearby sheep that no one ever tells him anything any more, and that they didn’t even mention him once in the newsletter. And then he realized the sheep was really a wolf in sheep’s clothing.

In the fuss of getting that resolved and requiring the security guards to undergo more training, the whole thing was forgotten. He didn’t send out newsletters that year, and so everyone only heard about the three little pigs and their adventures. The fourth little pig was fine with that.

Of course, wolves aren’t the only woodland predator. Humans also stalk the woodlands, searching for tiny structures to use in their miniature golf courses. The brick house, which had stood so valiantly against the magic wolf breath or whatever it was, was no match for humans and their house-stealing tools.

The humans rejoiced when they found the castle. They spent days dodging the flaming arrows from the squirrel archers and the boulders sent by catapult. The little animals knew they wouldn’t survive a siege. Humans had more resources, and humans collecting for miniature golf courses were relentless.

Under the cover of the archers and catapults, they dug their way out, surfacing in the woodland not far away. The humans had won. The archers and the last of the guards joined them, collapsing the tunnel behind them.

It was time to build again, perhaps somewhere farther away from human civilization and its miniature golf courses. On their way to somewhere else, they met the three little pigs. “We’re going to build again,” the second pig told them.

“This time, we’ll all build with brick,” the third pig said.

“No we won’t,” the first pig said, looking surprised. “My house was perfect, if it wasn’t for the bad luck with the wolf.”

“Like that would happen again,” the second pig added.

“But it could,” the third pig said.

“So could humans, and we can’t protect against them.” The first pig looked stubborn.

“Well, I’m going to protect against what I can,” the fourth pig said. His friends cheered in agreement.

They went their separate ways. The three little pigs built the same houses again, and their story repeated. The fourth little pig took a lesson from the wolves and he and his friends dressed in human clothing. They built a little village to live in, called it a miniature golf course, and charged admission. Every year, they got another Christmas newsletter from the three little pigs telling the same story, wolf and all. The fourth little pig never bothered to send out any newsletters.

Squirrel Guard