"Fireside Diaries"
Story Written by Freedom Fighter
You thought I was going to leave you hanging for a week, didn't you?
Disclaimer: The characters of 'Phineas and Ferb' belong to Disney. Songs used are property of the respective owners and such, except when noted as parody.
And now... the conclusion of this entry of the "Fireside Diaries"...
As firefighters fought to keep the Danville Community Center from completely burning down to the ground, Isabella was just trying to process what was going on.
"This... this can't be happening! NO!"
Gretchen, Adyson, Holly, and Ginger arrived on the scene simultaneously, and they too were in shock after seeing the burning building. But then they turned their attention to Isabella, who had just dropped to her knees and was on the verge of crying. They all ran to her side to comfort her, embracing her in a group hug.
"Isabella!" they all cried out.
"Girls! I... just wanted to show you what Chanukah was all about! And now... and now..."
She was beginning to struggle to speak clearly, as grief was starting to set in.
"...it's... it's all gone! IT'S ALL GONE!"
Gretchen grabbed her friend's head with the palm of her hands and turned the black-haired girl in her direction.
"Chief... what's all gone?"
"Chief? CHIEF!"
Isabella snapped back to reality upon hearing Gretchen's voice. Gretchen was standing before her, looking up at her with a worried look on her face.
"Are you okay, Chief? You were screaming as if something had happened to the Community Center!"
Isabella gasped upon hearing those words. "The Community Center?"
She was about to freak out again when Gretchen calmly pointed Adyson talking on her cell phone. Upon noticing that Isabella was looking her way, the taller brunette flashed a smile and gave her a thumbs up. She finished her conversation and then hung up.
"Everything's going smoothly," Adyson told the pair as she walked over to them. "Your mom's still waiting on that flour, though. I told Phineas we're still working on that."
"So the Community Center's not burning down? Whew, that's a relief!"
Adyson looked at Gretchen for clarification. The shorter brunette summed it up quickly, telling her in a whispered voice.
"If you're done freaking, Isabella..."
"I wasn't freaking, Adyson..."
Isabella was denying it even though she clearly had been in a panicked dream.
"...what ARE we going to do about the flour situation?"
Isabella thought for a minute. Nothing seemed to be coming to mind... until a transit bus drove past the trio. The advertising banner on the side was promoting free tours of the local Fireside Cupcake Factory this week.
"THAT'S IT!"
And suddenly, I, uh, I mean, we got a huge break!
-
Entry #189-2 [FSD302] - Chanukah, Part 2 (12.10.12)
-
A few minutes later, Isabella was talking on the phone with the sales manager at the Fireside Cupcake Factory, who thankfully had not yet gone home for the day considering it was already beginning to get dark. Once she was finished, she happily spun around to face her troop, all reunited once more in front of a bus stop.
"It was age discrimination!" Katie exclaimed, after relaying what had happened to the other girls. "They kicked us out because we were both under 18!"
"It's just a game show," Milly told her, apparently not offended about being ejected as her friend. "'Sides, who do you think would've ended up doing all the physical work?"
"Good news and bad news, girls," said Isabella, interrupting the conversation. "The good news is that the Cupcake Factory has flour AND is willing to donate half-a-dozen bags. After all, we're the troop that provides them with more than half of their annual production order!"
"What's the bad news?" asked Holly.
"All of their delivery drivers are either on out-of-town routes or have already gone home for the day. That means we'll have to go to the factory and pick up the flour ourselves."
That did not sound good to them, and they quickly voiced their complaints.
"Come on!"
"Awww..."
"No way!"
"Unbelievable."
"So far..."
"Ugh..."
But Isabella was not going to let them back out.
"Girls! We can do this! It's not that bad... we'll ride the bus there, get the flour, and then ride the bus back to the Community Center!"
Ginger raised her hand to ask a question. Isabella acknowledged her.
"Why can't we just get Phineas and Ferb and Baljeet to build us a flour-making machine?"
"Because they already have a big project to work on..."
The boys were seen sitting on the grass behind the Community Center, enjoying unwrapping some gelt and eating it, while their unfinished project sat behind them, still covered by a tarp.
"These are delicious and all," Phineas finally spoke up, as he pointed at the tarp, "but we really have to finish these before sundown."
"...besides, our job is to get flour, and that's exactly what we're going to do!"
Isabella then caught sight of the bus they needed to get on, but it was going slowly because the afternoon rush was in full swing, and it would be a few minutes before it could pull off into the loading area.
"Then again..."
She quickly changed the plan.
"Adyson, Holly, Milly, and Katie... you four head back to the Community Center. Help Phineas and Ferb finish whatever they're working on, and then see if you can get them to build a flour-maker, just in case. Gretchen and Ginger, you're with me!"
"But you said..."
"Yes, Ginger, I know what I said! But desperate times call for desperate measures!"
With that, Adyson's group ran off, while Isabella's team waited for the bus.
Meanwhile, back at Professor Poofenplotz's place, the skyscraper-high donut was getting closer to approaching its desired height. She was at ground level, inspecting the last few batches of donuts prior to them being placed in the oven.
"Good, good, good, go-wait a minute!"
She came across a tray of uncooked donuts placed next to a bag of flour. Only it was not flour, as the label was peeling off to reveal that it was actually salt. She held it up for all of the culinary students to see.
"Really? You're all culinary students and you didn't realize you were using salt and not flour? If any of you graduate, remind me to blacklist any restaurant that employs any of you donkeys!"
She tossed the bag into a nearby trash can, as well as the salted donuts. The students then grabbed the remaining good trays of donuts and rushed them into the oven.
"Well, at least you all have initiative when properly motivated. Now, as for the gigantic donut."
She gave the monstrosity the once-over, starting at the bottom and letting her eyes lift skyward. But near the top, she saw something unsightly lodged into the doughy treat. Part of it was inside of the donut and not visible, but she was still able to tell what it was with what parts were sticking out.
"A grappling hook?"
She followed the connecting rope and spotted a certain fedora-wearing puppy climbing paw over paw from the building's balcony.
"Pinky the Chihuahua? Oh, not this time."
She ran in to get something to stop her nemesis.
Meanwhile, Isabella's team had arrived at the Fireside Cupcake Factory. Inside, each of the girls was given two five-pound bags of flour, each in a plastic bag.
"Thanks!" Isabella said to the sales manager.
"You betcha!" she replied in return. "Keep selling those cupcakes, girls!"
The trio made their way out and towards the bridge, needing to cross the river to get back to the mainland and to the bus stop where they had been dropped off. Isabella and Ginger were having no problems carrying their bags. Gretchen, though, was visibly struggling. She was managing to keep from dragging them on the ground, however.
"All we have to do..." huffed Isabella, "is get back... to the Community Center..."
They were only about halfway across when, to Isabella's horror, she saw a bus pull up to the stop on the other side.
"Oh no! The bus! WAIIIIIIT! WE NEED TO GET ON!"
Of course, they were too far away for the driver to notice them, and even if he did, he could not wait, since in that part of town and that time of day, buses were running as much 15 minutes behind schedule. He pulled away from the stop.
A minute later, Isabella and Ginger finally got to the stop. Ginger immediately fell onto the bench to catch her breath, while Isabella put her bags down and went over to the bus schedule posted on the nearby glass canopy.
"The next bus we can take, even if it's on time, won't arrive for another 32 minutes!"
Ginger lifted her head up from the bench and glanced over her shoulder to look at the sun and where it was in the sky.
"It'll be dark by then!" Isabella shouted. "This isn't good! I'm supposed to be lighting the menorah at sundown! You don't know what I had to do to earn that honor, Ginger!"
She grabbed Ginger by the shirt and pulled her up until they were eye-to-eye. She then started shaking the Asian girl.
"Do you know what will happen if I'm not there to light the menorah? Everyone in the Jewish community will think I can't be trusted! Do you know what it's like to not be trusted? DO YOU?"
"Uh, no, but you're gonna tell me it's the worst thing ever?"
"IT'S THE WORST THING EVER!"
Isabella let go of Ginger, letting her drop back onto the bench. Ginger sat up, rubbing her chin, which was the part of her that end up taking the brunt of the landing, as she tried to calm her down.
"You can't be serious. Even worse than Phineas admitting he's in love with some girl OTHER than you?"
Isabella let out a horrifying screech, which nearly frightened Ginger out of her uniform.
"Yeesh. I just remembered why we let Adyson do all of the joking romantic jabs."
Seeing that she had scared her friend, though, was enough to get Isabella to calm down. As she got control of her senses, a very exhausted Gretchen finally caught up to them. She tried to fall on the bench, to relax. In her attempt to land face-up, though, she spun a bit much and ended up missing the bench completely, coming to rest on the sidewalk instead.
"Ow..." she mumbled, weakly.
"I didn't mean to snap, Ginger," apologized Isabella. "I wanted so hard to introduce you all to Chanukah and what a wonderful celebration it is. But now..."
"Don't blame yourself," Ginger told her. "There's no way you could've predicted the day would turn out like this!"
"I know, I know!"
Ginger got Isabella to sit down on the bench. Isabella let out a sigh of defeat.
"Guess there's nothing to do but to call Mom and tell her I'm not gonna make it."
She pulled out her cell phone from her pocket, but in the process, a small charm fell out as well. It landed on the sidewalk, in front of Gretchen. Isabella leaned down to pick it up, and upon doing so, showed that it was a charm in the shape of the Star of David. She looked it at it with forlorn, and then turned to Ginger, who had a look on her face that showed she was still hoping they could find a way out of their predicament.
And then...
BEEP! BEEP! BEEP!
"GINGER!"
Gretchen pushed up off the ground to join Isabella and Ginger into looking to see who had called the latter's room. Across the street, parked in front of a pharmacy, was Dr. Hirano.
"Mom?"
"Dr. Hirano! She can take us to the Community Center!"
"Well, doy, Isabella! From here, it's on the way back to my place!"
The girls crossed the street and got in, carrying their bags of flour, with Ginger hopping in the front passenger seat and Isabella and Gretchen getting in the back.
"I just hope we get there in time," Isabella said aloud.
Professor Poofenplotz had emerged once more from her building, carrying a hair dryer. In the time that she had been gone, Pinky had made his way down and around the donut, biting it and leaving holes in apparently random places. At this point, he was only about two stories above the ground.
"Not so fast, Pinky the Chihuahua!"
She aimed it at the puppy, intending to use the hair dryer to blow him off. Pinky responded by pulling out a one-pound box of yeast. Poofenplotz gasped in horror, having already guessed his plan.
"Wait! I designed this mega donut to only be forty stories tall and not an inch more! If you put any more yeast..."
She never finished her sentence, as Pinky tore off a corner of the box and then emptied the entirety of its contents into the hole he was next to. Immediately, the giant donut began to expand at an alarming rate.
"Arf!"
Pinky backflipped off the donut and landed on his two paws. He then ran off, leaving Professor Poofenplotz to deal with what was essentially a ticking time bomb of dough.
"No... NOOOOOOOOOOO!"
Finally, it reached its breaking point. The donut exploded, sending flour, dough, and thousands upon thousands of smaller donuts flying every which way. A good portion of it covered the nearest side of Poofenplotz's building almost completely, as well as those of the surrounding buildings. Poofenplotz was plastered as well, leaving her unable to move due to all of the stickiness of the remains.
A good chunk of the remnants that had been launched upwards from the donut arced out of the downtown area and headed for the suburbs. In particular...
Phineas and the others had come out from under the tarp, having just finished their work. Suddenly, he sensed danger.
"INCOMING!" he shouted, pointing at the sky.
At first, the group scrambled for cover. Then Phineas got an idea, as he grabbed a bowl that was conveniently nearby. He held it out and started catching some of the falling debris.
"It's raining... donuts?"
"And flour," added Ferb, as some of the white stuff had landed on his face.
The sun was almost completely down as Dr. Hirano's car came to a stop in front of the Community Center. Isabella, Gretchen, and Ginger got out with their bags of flour. To their surprise, they saw the boys trying to catch the donuts and the girls getting the flour.
"Oh my!" gasped Dr. Hirano as she saw the scene unfolding.
"Isabella!" Phineas shouted, acknowledging her arrival. "It's a Chanukah miracle!"
"We have enough flour and donuts to last eight days!" exclaimed Milly. "EIGHT DAYS!"
Mrs. Garcia-Shapiro and the other adults had walked outside to see what the commotion was all about. They, too, were stunned by what was going on.
"Isa? When I said we needed a lot of flour, I didn't mean this much!"
Isabella giggled, as she decided to act in the moment before walking over with the bags of flour she was carrying.
"Sorry, Mom! I guess us Fireside Girls don't know when to quit!"
Finally, the raining of flour and donuts ceased, and the kids started to bring in what they had managed to catch.
"I hope everyone has room for plenty of sufganiyot!" exclaimed Mrs. Garcia-Shapiro.
Everyone sounded off happily, especially Isabella's friends despite the fact that none of them knew what sufganiyot was... but the last few minutes had given them a big hint.
"Talk about a waste of an afternoon," declared Professor Poofenplotz as she stood there, stuck in place. "Well, at least I still have my looks... and a cleaning crew."
The cleaning crew was supposed to be the culinary students, but after seeing what happened, they were all leaving the mess where it was.
"Sorry," one of them apologized, "but our class time ended half an hour ago and we don't get paid for overtime, so... SEE YA!"
Seconds later, everyone was gone.
"CURSE YOU, PINKY THE CHIHUAHUA!"
Back at the Community Center, everyone was gathered around the menorah at the front of the main room. After a rabbi blessed it, he lit the shamash. Once it was lit, he handed it to the ceremonial menorah lighter, who was Isabella.
"Toda," she said, which means 'thank you' in Hebrew.
Everyone watched as Isabella used the shamash to slowly light the other candles on the menorah, one at a time. She started with the candle farthest to the left and made her way to her right. Once she was finished, she returned the shamash to its proper place, in the center of the menorah.
She bowed before it, and everyone else in the room did the same.
"Barukh atah Adonai Eloheinu melekh ha'olam, she'asa nisim la'avoteinu ba'yamim ha'heim ba'z'man ha'ze."
She then returned to her mother's side, but not before she could give her a hug.
"Good job, Isa!" she whispered to her hug.
"Thanks, Mom!"
The lights in the room were turned off temporarily, allowing just the menorah itself to provide a warming glow to the building's occupants.
Soon after, everyone gathered in a slightly smaller room in the Community Center, where a number of tables were set up for dinner. Isabella and the Fireside Girls raced back into the kitchen to prepare sufganiyot. Their leader split them into two groups. Half of them were tasked with making traditional sufganiyot from scratch, starting with flour, yeast, and other items. The other half took the regular donuts that had fallen from the sky and injected them with assorted flavors of jelly and then rolling the filled pastry back and forth in confectioners' sugar.
Isabella let each of them try one, and it only took one bite for all of them to give her a sign of approval. She would actually let them try the traditional ones too, but they would have to let the donut dough sit for more than an hour before they could be fried. So instead, they joined everyone in the makeshift dining room to eat dinner.
Everyone seemed to be having a good time as they ate a ton of fried food, including the faux-sufganiyot and latkes. Isabella was cutting apart a piece of the former to attempt to feed to Phineas, but she had second thoughts after seeing Buford grab one from a nearby tray and stuff it in Baljeet's mouth, whole.
After dinner, a group of adults serenaded those present with a round of traditional Chanukah songs.
"Chanukah, oh Chanukah! Come light the menorah! Let's have a party, we'll all dance the horah! Gather 'round the table, we'll give you a treat! Dreidels to play with and latkes to eat!"
Isabella could be seen singing aloud from her seat.
"And while we are playing, the candles are burning bright! One for each night, they shed a sweet light, to remind us of days long ago! One for each night, they shed a sweet light, to remind us of days long ago."
The singers began again from the start. Having caught on, Phineas started singing along with Isabella, followed by all of their friends.
"Chanukah, oh Chanukah! Come light the menorah! Let's have a party, we'll all dance the horah! Gather 'round the table, we'll give you a treat! Dreidels to play with and latkes to eat!"
The two of them got up from their seats and started dancing, while Ferb, Gretchen, and Adyson clapped to the beat to keep time.
"And while we are playing, the candles are burning bright! One for each night, they shed a sweet light, to remind us of days long ago! One for each night, they shed a sweet light, to remind us of days long ago."
Phineas and Isabella smiled at each other as the singers started humming an interlude before, once more, repeating the song.
A little while later, the kids all put on their coats and headed outside to see Phineas and Ferb's second surprise of the night. Isabella, Gretchen, and Ginger did not know what was under the tarp, so they were pleasantly surprised when it was pulled off to reveal a human-sized dreidel! Phineas smirked as he looked at Isabella.
"Do we know Chanukah, or do we KNOW Chanukah?"
Ferb got into a crane to place the dreidels in a holder. He used the crane's claw to hold the top-shaped device upright as Phineas took Isabella by the hand to a very long piece of string tied to the dreidel's handle. Everyone watched as Phineas put the string in Isabella's hand and motioned for her to pull it as hard as she could. The instant she pulled, Ferb simultaneously opened the claw's jaws. That allowed the giant dreidel to spin out of the holder and do a number of revolutions, moving towards the kids, until, finally, it tipped over and landed on its side.
As Isabella looked at the symbols on the visible sides of the dreidel to deduce what symbol was on the face-up side, Ferb answered her query by leaning out of the crane's cabin and holding up a sign with the symbol for gimel on it.
"Gimel? That means I won the pot!"
Isabella was ecstatic for a brief second before realizing something was off.
"Uh, Phineas, nobody put anything in the pot."
He shot her a sly smile. "Oh, really?"
He clapped his hands, and on command, an assortment of small objects was launched out of the face-up side. Phineas quickly handed Isabella a helmet and a bowl, and from there, she knew what to do.
She quickly figured out where everything was going to land, got there, and held out her bowl in front of her. In seconds, her bowl became filled with gelt, pennies, and raisins.
"I got 'em all!" she shouted, rejoicing.
"So," Phineas said, turning to the others. "Who else wants a turn?"
Buford, Baljeet, and all of the other girls all raised their hands.
Each of them was shown taking a turn. Most of them won a smaller pot of prizes from their dreidel spins, either half the amount of Isabella's take or just one or two random pieces. Buford was the only one whose dreidel labeled on the side with the symbol nun, which means he got nothing. Baljeet made the mistake of laughing at his bad luck, and Buford reacted by pulling out another can of chocolate-covered ants and trying to dump it on him.
But eventually, the night had to come to an end. The kids were back inside, this time enjoying sufganiyot for real as the adults began cleaning up.
"This is the best Chanukah ever!" Isabella exclaimed. "I'm so glad I was able to share it with all of you!"
"We should celebrate all of the holidays," Ferb declared. "Like Kwanzaa."
"Or Boxing Day!" suggested Buford.
Isabella gave him an odd look.
"Um, Buford? Boxing Day is not about the sport of boxing."
Buford had put on a boxing glove and was threatening to hit Baljeet with it.
"It's not? LAME!"
"There's only one thing that would make this last night even better!"
"Arf arf!"
"Oh, there you are, Pinky!"
She picked the shivering chihuahua off of the ground and gave him a hug.
"Where have you been, boy? You missed all the fun? But not the sufganiyot!"
She gave the last half of her Jewish donut to Pinky, who gently grabbed it with his teeth before starting to chew it down.
"HAPPY CHANUKAH!" they all exclaimed, waving goodbye towards the screen.
Pan over to a shot of the menorah, as the candles reached the end of the wick and went out on their own.
And that was the first Chanukah I ever spent with my friends! I hope you all enjoyed learning about my favorite holiday like all of them did! With that, toda and laila tov!
End Entry
Author's Notes:
So what did you think of the series' first holiday special? Again, I'm not Jewish, so I hope no one is offended by what transpired in these episodes. That being said, in this day and age, it's great that there are so many cultures and religions that many now deem acceptable, so I hope you all enjoyed this little tale about Chanukah.
Also, this special features the first appearances of Admiral Acronym and Professor Poofenplotz, Agent Pinky's boss and nemesis, respectively. This is the second appearance of Agent Pinky, though. His first? Way back in "Phineas is Mine!"
Next week, it's back to this season's main arc, in a pivotal episode that'll set the tone for entries to come! One of Adyson's presidential campaign promises was to get the school to serve some healthier options for lunch! She recruits one of her friends to help. Hint: It's a former rival and former love interest! Or... maybe the latter was never really former? You don't want to miss this one!