WeirDo Read online

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Acknowledgments

  Copyright

  CHAPTER 1

  GOOP

  GOOP!

  Here we go again. Even in a new school, in a new town, my year is about to start the exact same way it always does …

  ‘That’s an interesting name. What’s your surname?’ says Miss Franklin.

  That’s the bit I really hate. Why does everyone have to ask for your surname?

  ‘Weir, what’s your surname?’ she asks again.

  ‘Your name’s … Weir Do? It’s not really, is it?’

  ‘Yes, actually, it is,’ I reply.

  Get ready for it. In exactly three seconds, all the kids will start laughing …

  That’s the story of my life!

  What I would give for a surname like Smith or Jones or Chapman or Fletcher. Anything! Even GoopGoop goes better with Weir than Do.

  I guess when they gave out surnames,

  I lost … big time.

  Thing is, my dad was born in Vietnam. His last name is Do. (Yep, rhymes with go.)

  My mum’s last name before she married my dad was Weir. She really loved that name, so I got lumped with Weir Do! WEIRDO!

  LucKy Me!

  My parents could have given me any first name at all, like John, Kevin, Shmevin,

  ANYTHING!

  What about Rusty? Rusty Do sounds like a movie star

  Or maybe a famous country music singer.

  Instead I’m stuck with the worst name since Mrs Face called her son Bum.

  Now that was a funny roll call:

  Anyway, back to class …

  ‘Children, it’s rude to laugh at someone’s name,’

  says the teacher. ‘I’m sorry, Weir … Do.

  Please sit down, Weir … DO.’

  And then it started.

  I could tell the teacher was trying really hard not to laugh. It’s a sign when people’s cheeks puff up like they’re about to explode.

  I’m actually an expert on the subject.

  I’ve seen it a lot.

  Finally my new teacher ran out of the classroom …

  then she returned.

  I was so busy trying not to look embarrassed, I forgot I was wearing my sister’s old shoes …

  That’s when a girl reached down

  to help me up.

  As I looked into her face, I thought she was the

  most beautiful

  girl in the world.

  Her pencil case read,

  Bella allen.

  CHAPTER 2

  FARTER!

  I guess I should tell you a bit about my family.

  My sister’s name is Sally.

  Why did she get the normal name? Not that I’d like to be called Sally.

  Sally is older than me by three years and she is one of those people who always saves up her Easter eggs for months and months. It used to be great finding her hidden pile of eggs in June!

  But last year she’d had enough of me eating her stash, so she invented a way to make sure I never touched them again.

  Sally also likes to bug me with some

  really annoying habits.

  Then Dad gave me some tips on how to get her back.

  But then she figured out a way around it.

  Sally’s also one of those people who

  always makes her bed …

  In fact, almost everything she does makes me look bad.

  My little brother’s name is Roger.

  Another normal name, but read on

  he’s NOT normal.

  He has just become tall enough to use the toilet instead of his potty. But it’s not going so well so far. For the third time this week, he’s slammed the toilet seat on his thing …

  He’s also been dipping stuff in his baby food.

  Often stuff that is important.

  Roger is just starting to talk, and some words come out funny. Like when he tries to say Father, it sounds more like something else.

  Big Farter is actually a good way to describe Dad.

  My dad is one of those dads who tells you not to pass wind in public, but then when he feels like it, he just goes ahead and FARTS.

  If Mum’s nearby, Dad will try to blame it on something else that couldn’t possibly have made such a big noise.

  Like …

  Or …

  But if Mum’s not around and it’s just us kids, Dad likes to boast.

  And here’s a tip, if my dad ever asks you to pull his finger …

  DON’T!

  Just run the other way!

  If you’re too slow, it’s time to get out the clothes pegs.

  Here’s my mum. She’s one of those people who loves to save money. I don’t want to call her cheap … but she is.

  She won’t even let me change the water after Roger has a bath. And if Roger’s been playing in the dirt all day, I reckon I come out dirtier than when I went in.

  But the worst thing she does is she licks her hand to fix up my hair.

  Great. Now I look like the world’s biggest nerd and smell like the tuna sandwich Mum had at lunch.

  Mum’s cheap-ness also explains why I was wearing my sister’s shoes on the first day of school.

  They don’t really fit yet, but Mum says they will encourage my feet to grow.

  As if shoes

  speak to feet!

  The craziest person in our family is Granddad.

  He is Mum’s dad and he is

  really, really, really old.

  He is so old, sometimes bits of him just fall out.

  But he always pops everything back in place.

  If I got to choose robotic parts, I’d get some really fast legs. Cos I’m not a very fast runner.

  When they handed out fast running, I lost out.

  I lost out on tall-ness, too.

  And on good hair.

  I’m a bit different, I won’t lie. WEIRDO’s not just my name. It kind of describes the way I am …

  Like whenever I eat a hamburger, the meat always falls out the bottom. I hate that.

  And whenever I pull off a bandaid, I always rip off my scab too.

  I can’t eat the stringy stuff on the inside of a banana. That stuff tastes strange.

  But I LIKE lots of weird things too, like when it’s hot at night, and you turn your pillow over, the other side is nice and COOL!

  Like an extra pillow! I love that!

  I also like it when you have to PEE REALLY BADLY and you find a toilet just in time.

  Or when there’s an ad break on your favourite TV show, and you run out to do something really important but then you come back just in time!

  It’s also great when you mix up a packet of cheesy macaroni, and half way through eating it, you get that one

  But most of all, I love to draw!

  I like drawing

  anything,

  anywhere.

  I even like drawing on the steamy mirror after a bath.

  What I like drawing the most are animals.

  Not just any animals, but

  WEIRD animals.

  I like to mix them up!

  My favourite is a Duck crossed with a Poodle:

  Duck + Poodle

  = DOODLE!

  Or a Fish crossed with a Cat:

  Fish + Cat

  = FAT!

  Or a Frog crossed with a Pug:

  Frog + Pug

  = FRUG!

  At the end of the day, things aren’t too bad. There are some things that I’m GOOD AT.

  Like spelling
…

  And remembering people’s names.

  I do this by making a picture in my mind of something that rhymes with a person’s name.

  Like I remembered the name of a girl from my old school called Alana Stead by thinking of the words Banana Head.

  Of course Mrs Face’s kid is easy!

  CHAPTER 3

  WET

  WILLY!

  Let’s get back to my first day in my new school

  The bell rang for little lunch and I followed everyone out into the playground.

  I could see it was a normal playground with all the normal silliness.

  HOW TO:

  Smell the cheese

  I can’t believe some kids still fall for that!

  HOW TO: Arm Burn

  HOW TO: Wedgie

  HOW TO:

  shoe lacing.

  I looked over to the corner and saw Bella allen sitting with another girl from our class. It looked like she was about to get a

  Wet Willy in her ear!

  I rushed over to save her but tripped and fell again!

  Stupid shoes!

  So I called out from the ground …

  She turned and—

  Oh, NO! I just caused Bella to get a poke in the eye.

  I ran away and hid.

  That afternoon we had our first gym lesson with Mr McDool. His name is easy to remember.

  Mr McDool told us we were going to have our very own class Olympics. To make it seem more real, he even lit an old candle and called it the Olympic torch. He held it up high and some wax tipped out,

  burning his armpits.

  Mr McDool made ribbons to give out for first, second and third in the running races. I wish they had ribbons for second last.

  I’m really good

  at coming second last.

  I’ve learnt to hang back in the running heats. Don’t line up along a bunch of guys who look fast. Line up near the end with the guys who look slow.

  You can tell slow guys by a few sure-fire signs.

  But usually the best way to tell who’s the slowest is by finding the guy who’s got the top bit of his bum crack showing. He’s almost always going to be slow.

  In my new class that kid’s name was Toby Hogan. The others were calling him Money Box because it looked like his bum crack was a coin slot. He was the perfect choice to race with.

  Well someone must have put a

  hundred dollars

  in the coin slot before Toby’s heat, because it turned out

  Toby Hogan was

  super fast!

  We were standing around waiting for a row of girls to race when a kid called Josh Keenan started showing off his arm muscles. Before I knew what was happening, it turned into a muscle contest.

  Great, another contest for me to come in.

  Or worse, last!

  I tried to walk away but it was too late, it would’ve looked like I was chickening out. Everyone’s muscles were going to be bigger than mine.

  So when it was my turn, I did the

  very best flex I could manage.

  They didn’t know I was doing a trick that Dad showed me …

  It was going so well that I started showing off and turning so that all the girls could see.

  That’s when Toby Hogan saw what I was doing and busted me.

  Then they all started shouting:

  I thought they were just saying it cos it rhymes, but it turns out they weren’t. I’d backed into

  Mr McDool’s Olympic torch and

  my pants really were

  on fire!

  Mr McDool chucked a bucket of water on me to put it out.

  There’s that look again … he’s trying not to laugh!

  I stood there dripping wet while my whole class, including Bella Allen, stared at me like I was a complete …

  weirdo.

  The fire burnt a hole right in the middle of my school shorts. For the rest of the day I had to walk around sideways with my back to the wall so no-one could see my frog undies.

  I couldn’t wait till the bell at the end of the first day. When Mum came to pick me up, I ran to her as fast as I could.

  When I ran past Bella she called out,

  ‘Nice frogs!’

  UGH!

  I went blank! Half my brain wanted to call back: ‘Frogs are the best.’ The other half wanted to say: ‘Frogs are the coolest.’ But it came out all wrong.

  Boolest! Who says Boolest???!!!

  What a way to start the new year!

  CHAPTER 4

  DANG!

  The next day at school there was awesome news. Another new kid was starting. Since I had been there a whole day already, he was now the new guy.

  And when he walked in, it got even better.

  I thought to myself, YES!

  This guy makes me look

  SUPER normal!

  He’s going to take some of the attention off me …

  and I was right!

  Henry quickly became the strangest guy in the class. He did everything a bit differently. Like when you said his name, it took three goes before he’d turn around.

  And he has his own versions of nursery rhymes …

  Well, the other kids think he’s strange, but I think he’s pretty funny.

  That afternoon I found myself standing in line outside the PRINCIPAL’s office. Henry was there too.

  Turns out we were both there because of one guy Blake Green. It hadn’t taken us long to figure out that just about everything that Blake Green tells you to do, you shouldn’t do.

  When Blake first saw Henry he got the same look on his face that a dog gets when it looks at your ham sandwich.

  Henry told me what Blake Green made him do.

  Henry was there because Blake tricked him into going into the girls’ toilets.

  Here’s what happened to me:

  I managed to get three teachers angry with one bread roll.

  When it was my turn to go into the principal’s office, Henry did something I wasn’t expecting.

  He helped me out!

  So I thought I ought to help him out too.

  We grinned at each other, both convinced that we were

  out

  of trouble.

  We were wrong.

  DANG!

  I hate detention!

  But when we walked in, I got the

  best surprise of my life!

  Bella was in detention too! She was in trouble for accidentally elbowing the girl who gave her the wet willy!

  Bella is easily the prettiest girl in the class.

  Well, whenever Jenny, Clare, Mary, Sue, Yana and Wendy are away.

  But I liked her. I liked her

  And it turned out Henry liked her too!

  As soon as we walked in, he tried out one of his super smooth, talking-to-girls tricks:

  Bella moved away from Henry and closer to me. That’s when I realised that with Henry as my sidekick, I’d always be the cool one!

  So that’s how me and Henry became

  best friends.

  CHAPTER 5

  STINK!

  For the rest of the week me and Henry got up to loads of funny business.

  Henry thinks my drawings are cool, so I’ve been making some really funny ones for him:

  CHAPTER 6

  MEEP

  MEEP!

  The school principal, Mr Harris, came in to talk to our class about a very important matter.

  ‘Kids, we’ve recently discovered that many of you have animals living in your hair, called nits.’

  Animals living in my hair?! At first I thought:

  But it turns out these things are not so good for you. They’re tiny insects that suck your blood and make your head itchy.

  Mr Harris then told us all to line up so some nit inspectors could check our heads.

  I really hoped these guys didn’t check for worms as well, because I wanted to keep my pants on.

  They told us that if your head was i
t chy, it meant you probably had nits.

  As soon as they said this, my head felt itchy, but I didn’t want to scratch it. I think everyone felt the same. We all stood there with itchy heads that we were

  too afraid to scratch!

  At the end of it, Mr Harris told us that we all had nits.

  The whole class!

  We were each given a bottle of shampoo and told to stay home (yay!) until we’d really washed our hair.

  Then he told us that these creatures were brought to school by someone carrying them in their hair, and it all started a few days ago.

  Well, of course everyone right away turned to Henry. He’d just turned up a few days ago, and he had this guilty look on his face.

  It must’ve been him!

  I’d just made a new friend, and now he was the nit guy! I’d have to stay away from him …