Chapter 1 - That First Impression
I, Jack Kido , will take over my grandfather's farm and make it a success. I kept on thinking that whenever I started to get lazy or depressed. If I failed, my grandfather… well-- I don't like to think about it
Dad had seemed mad at me for wanting to leave for grandpa's farm. He didn't like the idea but he still sent me to grandpa's farm.
The car had stopped right in front of the farm. When I had got out my mom had followed me with the family dog (that was a puppy) and said, "Take care of him and he'll take care of you." I smiled and she had laid down the dog. Before I could say bye to my dad he had already drove away with mom. I looked left and right and walked into a building. It had a dusty pet bowl and some 12-14 logs of chopped wood. I was guessing this was the wood shed. And well since there was no dog house I minus well build a dog house for the little fellow. It had only took three logs and I thought it was easy so why not? 'Why not?!' I didn't know a single thing about building! I had ended up with -- well couldn't say… maybe a broken mini-pool table with a flap at the front? I guess that was too little wood. All of a sudden I had heard a giggle. When I looked up it was a girl with orange hair and blue eyes still laughing and giggling.
"What is that?", she finally said after a minute of laughing.
"Err… a dog house?", I blushed and grinned at the same time.
"Well it seems… err-- I mean you should try talking to the carpenters. Usually all the town's people use them. Oh, oops sorry. I forgot to introduce myself. I'm Ann Malthace and I had just saw a truck pass by to the old farm which is her and I was curious to see who was it.
"Oh, I'm Joe. Uh I mean-- Moe… N-I, uh mean Doe? DOH! No that's not my name. My names Jack-- Jack? Y-y-yeah, Jack Kido! *phew*", after that quote my face had turned from pink to red. I heard her giggle once more but this time it was shorter.
"Umm… do you mind if I walked with you to the carpenter's house? I don't think you know the way."
"Ok. Umm… why are we… oh wait-- never mind.", this time she just smiled a big smile. I smiled back.
On the way we had encountered some people in town. The only way to the mountains was through the main town. Everybody was staring at me or was it Ann? Some people just said hi to Ann while she replied back. But why were some people staring at me like they'd seen a ghost? Was it me? Ann? Ann and I? Flyer open?!
When we had arrived at the mountains near the carpenter's house the carpenters had looked at us the same way with the town's people. Then we had actually entered one of their houses. The carpenter in there replied with "Wud'da ya need?" in a low toned voice. He wasn't really concentrating on us, just his planner.
"My new friend-- uh I mean friend…". 'Wait a minute', I thought 'I thought I was new'… "needs a dog house." Ann replied graciously. When the carpenter heard "new friend" he had looked up at us and was in a shocked sate.
"Ooh… "FRIEND" Huh? Don't your mean B--" the carpenter paused as Ann had stared back in a mad-state.
"Well, he just needs a dog house.", she finally replied.
"Alright it'll cost--", the carpenter stared closely at me. "--umm are you new here?"
"He's the new farmer taking over the old farm.", Ann grinned.
"I guess you can have your dog house for free as a first time person. I'll send over another carpenter to help you guys."
We had finally headed back to my grandpa's farm along with a carpenter. On the way I picked several different herbs.
The dog house was finished. All it cost me was just some old wood from my woodshed. I had placed a dog bowl next to the dog house and put the herbs I picked as dog food. The dog started munching on the herbs and the carpenter had ran back home. I thought the dog was cute eating and so did Ann too. We looked at each other and our dog started to stop eating and look at both of us. 'Was it? Could it be that--? Nah.' Both Ann and I then looked at our standing ground and then the dog continued to eat.
"Oh, um, I forgot what was your dog's name again?", Ann suddenly asked. I had forgot it completely Then I had just made one up.
"Err-- Nate."
"Nate? That's a nice name. Hmm… its nearly 12:00 PM I got to go now."
"Bye." Ann had then left off. She had came back at eight PM.
"It's 8:00 PM. Care to join me watch the stars on the mountain top?"
"Fine by me.", I said.
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When I had gotten into the house Ann had said good-bye and went back home. As I was about to sleep I had found a book on the table to the right of the bed. It was grandpa's diary! I had skipped to the last page he wrote on and started to write the times continuing on grandpa's farm.
Log001 Jack Summer 5 Thursday
This farm work looks hard and well I hope to get better at it soon. But Ann today, a girl I met turned around everything. I hope she can teach me more.
Chapter 2 - Show Ann Win
"Jack? (chain of echoes) Jack! (another chain of echoes)."
I had blinked for a second trying to make out who said that. When the blur was gone I could see it was--
"ANN?! W-what-- err how did you--"
"--get into your house? You left your door open. You know your should be more careful. There are wild dogs around here and they're of course dangerous."
"Uh, thanks for the warning. But what-- I mean why did you come here for? And plus its rude to barge in."
"Sorry, my dad wants to… well lets just say I'm your tour guide for you today. I kind of want to hurry this on. So where do you want to start?"
"Umm… well, tools I guess…", I said. I kind of felt embarrassed but I hadn't even used one of those tools from my grandfather's tool shed. Still, I didn't know so it had to be done. Ann had shown me step by step on how to use the tools. It didn't really seem like she was hurrying.
"Alright, now hold the sickle like this…", I had then held the sickle. She had giggled.
"Heh, you look like Death.", she commented. I just took that as a compliment.
"Ok now, once you know how to handle this really good you can cut more patches at a time. Although you need to send it to Rick whereas he'll "sharpen" your tools. He's easy to recognize on the west side of town. You should see a hammer as a sign on his door. He's orange haired and well that's all there is to know. Us two are the only orange hairs, I think. She had then shown me the highest she could cut up to was three patches of weeds in front of her while I could only cut one. I felt embarrassed again. As Ann helped me to other tools I could only do one patch with one tool while could hoe two spaces with the hoe and break a rock and log two times faster than me. She had then shown me other tools like the animal brush, milker, clippers, and lastly how to use the animal medicine.
"Well, that was fun. What now?"
"I'd like to see the tour of the town now."
"Oh yeah, that's right. I was meaning to buy seeds. I'll show you how to plant when we get back."
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I don't know if Ann even liked being a tour guide for me. Or maybe she did? It was maybe 50/50 -- or 65/35. 65 meaning how much she liked it from 35 meaning how much she hated it. Oh well… at least she planted three patches of melon seeds for me.
Right now it was nearly 5:00 PM and so I gave Nate , my dog something to eat. All of a sudden a voice called my name while I was inside the house.
"Yo! Mr. Kido? You there?" I opened the door to find out that it was the mailman.
"Oh, hi… uh-- Bill. What is it?"
"How'd you know my name? I though-- aren't you new here?"
"Well your name tag says--"
"Oh ok. Well here's the mail for today."
Bill had just then left. I had opened the letter and it said:
Dear Mr. Kido,
You are entitled to join our Cow Festival at 5:30 PM. Sorry for the urgent news. See you there at town square!
Sincerely,
Mayor Charlie Tom
'Hmm…' I thought to myself. 'That'd be interesting. There I can kind of learn some tips for breeding cows, I guess.' So I went excitedly.
It took around 15 minutes to walk to the festival's holding place, town square. People were still setting up the whole place. Then I saw the mayor coming towards me.
"Ah, Jack you actually made it!"
"Well yeah, I'd thought it'd be interesting."
"Since you don't have a cow ready or you don't even have a cow you can just vote."
"Ok."
At 5:30, when the contest actually started, cows started entering everywhere. The mayor said we have 25 minutes to judge. Everywhere cows had their shiny coats glimmering. I had drank pasteurized milk from five cows. For some reason the second cow had sweet milk. And I think the fourth and fifth cows had the best affection rate to everybody around them. The first had the shiniest coat and produced two times the average milk form a full grown cow. And the third cow had a saddle where you actually ride the cow at five miles per hour. These cows are one though decision. When I asked their breeding tips from a few farmers they said it was a family secret. Hmm… I guess I'll vote for #1.
"All judges report to the fountain turn in your votes and contestants to the side of the fountain." Was it the end of 25 minutes already? Everybody had turned in their vote and then--
"And the winner for this year's Cow Festival is *crowd gasps* Ann and her brother Matt Malthace who owns cow #4!"
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Log002 Jack
Summer 6 Friday
Today was interesting. The best about today was that I got three melon seed packages for free and Ann helped me plant them. I went to the cow festival today and it looks like a hard contest for the best cows. I don't think I'll ever go to their levels… for now.
