From The Planet Bog!
                                                         

                     Want to be a famous chef? Think again!
 

The microwave oven was sitting in the middle of a pile of old pots and pans when Kevin first saw it at the junk sale. Its sides were covered with dirt and rust, and its door was hanging open. It was a mess, but he thought that it might just have possibilities.
     "Look at that!" he exclaimed, tugging on his dad's arm.  "I wonder how much it is?"
     Kevin's dad walked over to the microwave oven and peered at the price tag that was stuck to it. "Only five dollars," he answered. "But Kevin, why would we want this piece of old junk? We don't need a microwave oven; we already have a nice new one at home."
     "I'd like to have my own microwave, Dad," explained Kevin. "I could clean it up and set up my own kitchen in our garage. It would be fun - I'd get a chance to practice my cooking without making a mess in the house."
     Kevin's dad shook his head and sighed, wondering why his son would want to buy a microwave oven and practice cooking instead of playing outside on his bike, like most of the other boys in their neighbourhood.
     "Well, I suppose there's no harm in you buying it if that's what you really want," he said, after a minute's thought. "Let's ask the man if it works and if it does, you can go ahead and get it."
     "Thanks Dad!" grinned Kevin.
     Five minutes later, they were driving home with the microwave oven in the back seat of the car. The man running the junk sale had promised it would work and had even taken a whole dollar off the price. He seemed to be in a hurry to get rid of it...
     Kevin knew that his dad thought it was a bit strange that he wanted a microwave oven of his own, but he didn't care. For as long as he could remember, he'd wanted to be a chef when he grew up. Every week he watched chefs on television, cooking up a storm for their viewers. They were rich and famous, they travelled to all sorts of exotic places and cooked all sorts of interesting food. They also lived in great big mansions and had lots of girlfriends. Kevin was sure that one day when he was older he could be just like them. And now that he had his own microwave, he was going to prove it!

                                        ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

     "What have you got there?" asked Kevin's next door neighbour Jenny, when she saw him take his microwave oven from the car and  put it in the garage.
     Jenny was in his class at school and Kevin thought she was the biggest sticky-nose he had ever met.
     "It's my own microwave oven," he muttered, putting it down on his dad's work bench.  "I bought it at a junk sale, so I can practice cooking."
     Jenny grinned at him and shook her head. "You're nuts," she giggled. "Boys can't cook, everyone knows that."
     "Of course boys can cook!" exclaimed Kevin. "Some of the best chefs in the world are men. You should know that; I've seen you and your mum watching that fancy French chef on TV every Saturday morning."
     "That's different," said Jenny. "He's a grown-up and besides, he's French."
     "What's that got to do with it?" grumped Kevin, wishing she would go away so he could get on with the job of cleaning the microwave and setting up his kitchen.
     "Are you going to try to make something for our end of semester party at school next week?" asked Jenny.
     "I might," replied Kevin.
     "Well, I bet whatever you make will be horrible," she laughed spitefully. "Like I said, boys can't cook!"
     With that, she ran off back to her own house.
     "Good riddance," Kevin muttered unhappily. He knew that Jenny would tell everyone in their class what he was up to. She was the worst gossip in school, as well as a sticky-beak.

                                   ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

     "I hear you're going to make something really nice for our party on Thursday," Kevin's teacher said to him, when he took his seat in class on Monday morning. "Jenny tells me that you've got yourself a microwave oven of your very own."
     Kevin gulped and nodded. Jenny had blabbed to everyone, just as he'd thought she would.
     "Can you make us a chocolate cake Kevin?" asked one of his friends.
     "No, banana!" said someone else.
     "Perhaps you could do both," said the teacher. "I'll be looking forward to a piece of cake myself."
     Kevin didn't like to tell them that he'd only just started to learn to cook, and wasn't sure if anything he made would turn out right.
     I'll just have to get plenty of practice in, he thought.
     After school, Kevin stopped off at the supermarket on his way home and used some of his pocket money to buy a packet of cake mix. His mum bought packet cake mixes all the time and he guessed they couldn't be too hard to make.
     I'll test this out and if it works, I'll try to make a sponge cake from a recipe
book, he thought.
     His parents were still at work when he got home, so he put his schoolbag away and borrowed some things from the kitchen.
     "Let's see," he said. "A mixing bowl, a wooden spoon, a measuring jug, some water, an egg and a microwave dish to cook the cake in. That should do."
     Kevin carried everything through to the garage.  He carefully read the
instructions on the packet of cake mix and in no time at all, he was ready to cook. He put the water, eggs and cake mix into his bowl and stirred them all together. Then he poured the mixture into the microwave dish and licked his sticky fingers. Mmmm, the cake tasted good already!
     The instructions on the packet said to cook the mixture for ten minutes, so Kevin opened the door of his microwave and put the dish inside. But when he went to switch it on, he got a bit of a surprise. Although he'd cleaned the microwave thoroughly the day before, he hadn't really noticed that the buttons on the side of it weren't quite the same as the ones on his mum and dad's. The numbers on them looked strange and he couldn't read them properly.
     Why didn't I see this yesterday? he wondered. That must be why it was so cheap. The buttons are in another language or something.
     He pressed in what he hoped was ten minutes on the timer and stood back to see what would happen. A light went on inside and the microwave started up. It seemed to be working.
     "Hello, it's Wonder-Chef. What are you cooking?" asked Jenny, in a loud voice that made Kevin jump.
     She had sneaked into the garage when he wasn't looking.
     "Just a cake for dessert tonight," he replied, folding his arms. "Nothing special."
     "I'll wait to see how it turns out," she said. "Let's see how good  you really are."
     "Get lost," said Kevin. "Go and make your own cake,  you're not getting any of this."
     He was desperately hoping she'd leave before the cake was ready. What if it didn't work out  properly? She'd be sure to tell everyone at school and he'd be a laughing stock.
     "I'll just wait a little bit longer," grinned Jenny, leaning back against the garage wall.
     Kevin was about to tell her to get lost again when the microwave went PING.
     "Go on then, open the door and let's have a look," she said.
     Kevin frowned. He didn't want to do it in front of Jenny, but couldn't think of a good reason not to. Reluctantly, he opened the microwave door. Thick brown smoke drifted out and he blinked his eyes in surprise. What had happened to the delicious cake mix?
     "Pooh!" yelled Jenny, holding her nose. "What an awful smell!"
     Kevin pulled out his mum's microwave dish. Inside it, instead of a nice chocolate cake, there was a horrible mess that looked like baked brown slime.
     "I don't believe it," he whispered. "This doesn't even look like the same lot of cake mix."
     "That's disgusting," coughed Jenny. "I wouldn't even feed that to pigs! Give up now Kevin, you're a useless cook."
     She hurried back to her own house to get away from the smell.
     Feeling very sorry for himself, Kevin poked the mixture with his wooden spoon. It bubbled and hissed, spitting out more brown smoke and smelling even worse. He noticed that it was stuck fast to the microwave dish and the dish was ruined. Feeling guilty for wrecking his mum's good dish he went outside and quickly threw it into the garbage bin, hoping that she wouldn't miss it. A tear trickled down his cheek and he sniffed miserably.
    Perhaps Jenny was right and he should give up. He couldn't even cook a packet of cake mix, so how was he supposed to make fancy cakes for the school party? Everyone in his class would  laugh at him. Then suddenly, Kevin had an idea. Perhaps there had been something wrong with the cake mix. Perhaps it wasn't his fault at all! Tomorrow on his way home from school, he would call in to the supermarket again and buy a different brand.

                        ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

    The next day when Kevin got to school, he found that Jenny had told everyone what happened.
     "Ha ha, it was a big joke," he laughed, thinking quickly. "I put smelly mud in the dish on purpose, just to upset Jenny."
     Some of the kids laughed and Jenny looked furious.
     "Good one, Kevin," said his friend Tom. "Too bad she didn't stick her finger in and have a taste."
     "It's not true," shouted Jenny. "You should have seen the look on his face when he opened the microwave door. He got the shock of his life! You'll see, when Thursday comes around, Kevin won't be bringing any cakes to school."
     "Don't worry," Kevin smiled at his friends, crossing his fingers behind his back. "The cakes for the party will be fine."
     After school, Kevin went to the supermarket and spent more of his pocket money on the most expensive cake mix he could find. It was called "Chocolate Indulgence " and there was a beautiful picture of a great big chocolate sponge cake on the front of the box. There was even a little packet of chocolate icing inside to spread out on the cake after it was cooked.
     Surely I can't go wrong with this one, he thought.
     Kevin rushed home, borrowed some more stuff from the kitchen, and went straight into the garage. This time he locked the garage doors so Jenny couldn't get in.
     "I hope this works," he whispered to himself, reading the instructions.
     He carefully put the cake mix, some butter, two eggs, and some water into a bowl and mixed them together. Then he tipped the mixture into another of his mum's microwave dishes and switched the oven on.
     BANG! went the cake mix inside. BANG! went the microwave oven.
     "Oh, no," sighed Kevin. "It's blown up."
     Opening the door, he found sticky green slime splattered in big lumps all over the inside of the microwave, and his mum's dish was broken in two.
     "Hey, this isn't my mixture!" he exclaimed in surprise. "That cake mix wasn't green, and what's happened to the microwave dish?"
     "Just what do you think you're doing?" asked a voice behind him. "How dare you keep sending this rubbish through the weezlegog!"
     Kevin froze. How did someone get inside the locked garage? He slowly turned around and stared at the weirdest looking person that he'd ever seen. Sitting in the middle of the garage inside a strange round bubble was a roly-poly little lady, dressed in a long silver gown. Her skin was fluorescent orange and her hair was purple. She was so bright and sparkly that Kevin had to squint his eyes to look at her. She stepped out of the bubble and put her hands on her hips.
     "H... h...how did you get in here?" he stuttered nervously.
     "Never mind that! What are you doing with my weezlegog?" asked the lady.
     "Weezlewhat?" asked Kevin. "It's a microwave oven. I bought it at a junk sale."
     The lady looked at him and her eyes glittered and glinted.
     "I'm telling the truth!" Kevin insisted. "It's just a microwave oven!"
     "Oh dear," she said, suddenly sounding a lot less angry. "I think there might have been a mistake. You really don't know what you've got there, do you."
     Kevin began to feel a bit braver. "Did you turn my cake into that green stuff and break my mum's dish?" he asked.
     The lady walked over to the microwave and looked at the slime. "This isn't your cake," she said. "It's one of my delicious exploding creations. And the weezlegog is not an oven; it's a small matter transporter."
     "What?" asked Kevin, who didn't understand what she meant.
      "It's a kind of inter-galactic post box," the lady explained. "This one is used for transporting food and right now, your cake is sitting in my kitchen on the other side of the galaxy."
     Kevin wasn't sure whether to believe the weird lady or not, but he couldn't explain how she'd arrived in his garage in the strange bubble and he couldn't explain what had happened to his cakes. Maybe she was telling the truth... No wonder the man at the garage sale had wanted to get rid of the microwave oven, or weezlegog, or whatever it was!
     "Who are you?" he asked.
     "I am Tilda, master chef from the planet Bog," the lady answered. "Many years ago I did a tour of the galaxy in my space bubble, to check out the foods on different planets. I made a whole series of interesting recordings about my travels, a little like what you would call a television series. When I visited Earth I accidentally lost the weezlegog, which I was using to send food samples back to my home planet. When you used the machine I was able to lock onto its location and find it. Now I want it back."
     It was all too much for Kevin. Aliens, matter transporters, alien food - all he'd wanted to do was practice his cooking and make some cakes for his school party. If Tilda was telling the truth and his microwave oven wasn't a microwave oven at all, he'd wasted his pocket money on it and wouldn't be able to make the cakes himself.
    What would his parents say when they found out? They'd never believe a story about alien matter transporters and they'd just think the microwave oven broke. He'd have to ask his mum to help him make some cakes and then she'd notice that her microwave dishes were missing.
     Kevin began to cry.
     "I really needed that microwave oven," he sobbed.
     Then he told the little alien lady about the cakes for the school party and the ruined microwave dishes.
     "I see," she sighed, when he had finished. "I must say that I do feel rather responsible for this mess. Perhaps I can help you; I really hated the food on this planet but I seem to remember what Earth cakes are made of."
     "Do you think so?" sniffed Kevin.
     Tilda picked up the weezlegog and smiled. "Be right here at the same time tomorrow," she said. "I'll see what I can do."
     She stepped back inside her bubble and with a flash and a bang, she was gone. Kevin rubbed his eyes and looked around the garage.
     "Did it really happen?" he wondered.
      The microwave was gone and the garage smelt of green slime.
     Yes - it had really happened.

                       ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

     The next day, Kevin was very quiet at school. Every time they looked at him, Jenny and her friends giggled.
     "They still think you can't cook," said Tom, who knew how much he wanted to be a chef. "When you're famous, you'll be able to laugh at them."
     Kevin nodded, wondering what would happen in the garage after school. If Tilda didn't come up with something good, he was doomed!
     When Kevin got home from school, he went straight to the garage and locked himself in. Everything was dark and quiet. Tilda wasn't there. He waited and waited, but nothing happened. Just as he was about to give up hope, there was a loud explosion and a puff of smoke.
     "Oh dear," said Tilda getting out of her machine. "This old space bubble needs a tune-up. It's not working as well as it used to."
     She put three big boxes down on the work bench. "Take a look," she smiled.
     Kevin slowly opened one box. Inside were thirty little iced chocolate and banana cakes. Carefully he lifted one out and took a bite.  "These are yummy!" he exclaimed.
     Tilda pulled a face. "Those cakes are the most horrible things I've ever cooked."
     "I don't think so," said Kevin, with his mouth full.
     "Open the other boxes," urged his new friend.
     Kevin lifted the lid of the next box. Inside were two brand new microwave
dishes, identical to the ones he'd borrowed off his mum. "How did you get these?" he asked.
     "The weezlegog stores a memory of the objects it transports," Tilda explained. "It was easy to reconstruct two dishes like yours."
     Kevin  shook his  head in amazement.
     "Hurry up and open the last box," said Tilda impatiently. "I haven't got all day, you know. I'm cooking a dinner for the king of Bog tonight!"
     Kevin hurriedly did as she asked. "Why are you giving me the weezlegog back?" he asked, when he saw what was inside.
     The box contained a machine that looked just like the weezlegog
     "It's not the weezlegog," smiled Tilda. "It's a Bogian oven that I had disguised as your old 'microwave oven', so that nobody would ask you where you got it from. Bogian ovens are much better than the old fashioned microwaves you have here on Earth. With this you will become a great chef - even if I think the food you cook is revolting."
     "Oh thank you!" cried Kevin. "This is fantastic!"
     "It's my pleasure," Tilda replied. "I'm always ready to help a fellow chef. There is one thing though; you must promise never to tell anyone about me, or the weezlegog, or your new oven. Most of the people of your planet don't know about us Bogians, and that's the way we'd like to keep it."
     "I won't tell a soul," Kevin promised. "After all, who'd believe me anyway?"
     With a cheery wave and a wink, Tilda climbed back inside her bubble and disappeared. Kevin looked at the cakes, the microwave dishes and his new oven and sighed with happiness. It looked as though things were going to turn out okay after all.

                     ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

     Jenny's mouth fell open with surprise when Kevin turned up at the school party the next day with "his" cakes.
     "What a wonderful chef you are," the teacher said, as he stood them in the middle of the party table with all the other food. "I must say, I'm very impressed."
     "Delicious Kevin," chuckled Tom, taking a big bite from one.
     "Will you make some cakes for my birthday party?" asked one of Jenny's friends. "I'm sure my parents would pay you if you made cakes like this. They're much better than the ones from our local cake shop."
     "You must give me the recipe, Kevin," said the teacher, taking a banana cake for herself.
     "I wish you'd made some more," said one of  his other friends. "These will be gone in no time."
     Kevin grinned when he saw Jenny pick up a cake and take a little test bite. Then she quickly shoved the rest of the cake in her mouth.
     "See,"  he said to her. "Boys really can cook when they want to."
     "Yeah, I suppose you're right," she agreed reluctantly. "Nice job Kevin. I'm...er... sorry I was mean to you."
     "That's okay," he replied happily, thinking about Tilda, his new oven, and the weezlegog from Bog.

                                                                      
                                                     THE END

Copyright 2009: Heather Hammonds.
This story may be downloaded and used by individuals or classes for the purposes of study, research, criticism or review, or as permitted under Part VB of the Copyright Act. No part of this story may be otherwise reproduced without permission from the author. Enquiries should be directed to the author's e-mail address.