Tick Tock Turkey and the Festival of Honolulu - Tick Tock Turkey
Tick Tock Turkey fans have been begging us for more tails of the time-travelling bird. In fact, they've been begging us for YEARS ! We are pleased to say that Tick Tock's creator, Michael Brett has penned another story for us (with a little help from Natasha). And here it is...
As you may recall, Tick Tock Turkey lives on Egg Island with Future Dog and various other creatures. They have been planning a huge Honolulu style festival. The weather should be as perfect as it (almost) always is on Egg island. It seems like all is set for a wonderful party.
Written by Michael Brett with some encouragement and ideas from Natasha.
Read by Natasha.
Tick Tock Turkey and Future Dog had been on Egg Island for some time now, and it was known to be one of the best Islands around. In order to celebrate, the good people of Egg Island were going to put on a festival with a local troupe of dancers on board a giant Hawaiian boat out at sea. There was going to be Honolulu dancing and there would be reeds. And the penguins were going to do an acrobatic sea show in which they all climbed on top of one another to make the shape of a pyramid, and the ones at the top would wave some pompoms… They were getting a bit carried away.
The float could take on board quite a few hundred people, so once it was ready all the creatures of Egg Island could hop on board. There would be an inflatable raft that would drop down to the beach on the shore edge, so all the creatures could travel to the float. The Honolulu performance festival would last two days and three nights and would take place in late July.
A few hundred yards out into the sea of Egg Island, upon the Carnival float, Tick Tock Turkey was still working on the giant sign to advertise it to the Island. He was to be managing the float this year and he also had to prepare all the different drink preparations for the carnival procession in advance. Coconut and Pineapple Smoothie Delight. Mango and Passion fruit Surprise. Strawberry fresh and Chocoloate swirl crush. The list was endless. Cocktail sticks and straws....
“Ahhhhh,” said Tick Tock Turkey as he dropped a small cocktail stick, whatever will I do...?”
and he slipped over backwards on some gooey liquid and onto Clive the Crab. Tick Tock Turkey’s friend was helping him out. He put his scissors down from opening some Tomato Juice, to help his friend up who was now covered... in strawberry juice.
“I think we need a little more elp” said Clive. “Ave you thought about getting some people to help with serving ze drinks from Egg Island? Maybe ze monkeys will elp...?”
Tick Tock Turkey turned his head sharply in dismay... “Oh no, not the monkeys! They’re not to be trusted! We need some more sensible creatures.”
“Well, I do know a few starfish,” said Clive.
Tick Tock Turkey smiled: “Ok, let me know!”
Meanwhile back on the beach, Future Dog was teaching some Yoga for poise and posture to the award-winning troupe of festival dancers. They had put together a wonderful dance of spiral, turns, leaps and shimmies but they had been practising so hard some of them were starting to complain of backache.
Future Dog led them into the Cat position: “This isn’t my favourite,” she said slowly and calmly, “but it will sort your back out.”
They all let out a big sigh of relief: “Ahhh!!!”
As the evening drew on they saw the red sun setting out at sea, and Tick Tock and Clive returned from making lots of drink preparations.
The Honolulu dancers, who seemed to have never stopped dancing, were swaying silently.
“How are you?” said Tick Tock to Future Dog, who was sitting under a palm tree in a meditating position whilst reading her favourite book.
“Oh not too bad,” she said, “I'm just leaving the dancers to it.”
“Yes, good idea,” said Tick Tock, “have you considered giving them some music to dance to?
Future Dog looked up.
“I’ve got a great Elvis Collection you know. And it could work just the treat.”
“Yes, that could well lighten them up.”
“Blue Moon!”
They both nodded their heads in agreement.
“I’ll get my iPod and see if I can download it from Egg café,” said Future Dog. It will be much simpler that way. See you soon!”
And off she padded into the path through the palm trees.
Tick Tock looked out to sea. He could see the raft bobbing up and down on the waves.
“Hmm… What to do? Ahhh yes… Clive said he would ask the starfish for me to see if they could help…”
But as he looked down the long peach-coloured beach of Egg Island he could see Clive scuttling off in the distance on his way home..
“I’ll ask him tomorrow.”
The next morning, Tick Tock Turkey woke up to the sound of Blue Moon. He had fallen fast asleep through tiredness under Future Dog's Tree, and now he could make out in the haze of heat of the Island the dancers moving in a long line backwards and forwards just as he had imagined. They were also making circular patterns…
“Ah that must be for the moon,” he thought. “I wonder if they can make the shape of an ellipse? (Which is a half-shape moon.)
Future Dog was waving directions at them with twinkling butterfly hands; she was truly proficient at this.
“Are you going out to the raft today?” she called out to Tick Tock Turkey.
Tick Tock Turkey spun around: “Whhhhhhhhhhh oh yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeehhhhhhhhhhhh…”
He felt a bit dizzy
“This song is working a treat! Thanks Tick Tock,” said Future Dog, smiling delightedly. She had her coolest pair of shades on for the sun was beating down very heavily today and there was not a cloud in sight in the blue sky. “Be sure to wear some sun-cream,” she said.
“Yes yesss...”
And off he scuttled by the raft, just in time to see Clive with three gorgeous, golden starfish following him...
“You're a gem!” he said.
“This is Sparky, Suki, and Sarah.” said Clive, introducing the three starfish who had beautiful, big, gleaming eyes.
“Hello,” they chorused.
“And zey are not only good at making ze drinks, but zey can sing too!”
“Excellent,” said Tick Tock.
“Let’s get on board that raft. We've got lots more preparation to carry on with before this show goes out on the road. Don't you think? And I need to see how the Penguins are getting on.”
They climbed into the little rubber dinghy and as they drew closer to the Carnival float, they could see the penguins ascending into the air like sky rockets...
“Weeeeeeeeee!” said the starfish in delight, for they had never seen anything like it.
“How on Earth are they doing it?” said Tick Tock.
“I think zey must have got ze Trampoline out. At least zey are practicing...”
But Tick Tick Tock Turkey did not like it one bit. He pulled out his mega speaker cone-shaped microphone.
“Stop this, this instant!” he called out. “This is highly dangerous and not to be done on board the carnival float!”
All the penguins squealed and jumped one by one off the trampoline and back into the sea landing one on top of the other to form a pyramid.
“Wowweeeeee!” chorused the starfish, clapping their hands...
But Tick Tock pursed his lips and held his breath. He wasn't too happy.
“Well, it looks trés impressive,” said Clive climbing on board the raft.
“Yes,” said Tick Tock, “but I don't trust those Penguins. They are dangerous... If anything happens I’ll get it in the neck. Just be careful,” he said as he looked out to sea. And they were all playing a little bit more safely now, splashing about in the waves.
“Throw them some of the arm bands,” he said to Clive. “That'll keep them safe in the waves for now. Right, starfish come with me!”
Tick Tock Turkey led all the creatures up the raft and onto the festival boat. The performance acts were due to start at 6pm that night, and Tick Tock Turkey was getting excited.
Clive the Crab was busy making milkshakes and they had shown one another differences in what they had been doing.
All the Egg Island creatures crammed on board and were awestruck by the sight they saw. The Penguin Gymnasts has formed a super triangle and were waving brightly-coloured festival flags in the air. The Penguin at the top was wobbling a bit, which amused Tick Tock Turkey, but Future Dog was scowling slightly. She didn’t trust the menacing little Penguins one bit. Suddenly off they jumped and scattered left right and centre, popping off in all directions like fire crackers. Luckily they still had their arm bands on and they floated when they hit the water off the boat.
Tick Tock Turkey turned to Future Dog: “Impressive!” he said.
Future Dog leaned forward: “Hmmm. At least they held it together.”
“Right I’m off,” said Tick Tock, looking at his watch, “I've got an announcement to make for the Cocktail Buffet. Do you want me to introduce the Hawaiian Dancers, FD?”
“Yes, that would be fab,” she said, perusing the deck for her dancing troupe.
“Hmm, I can’t see any of them anywhere, but possibly they will all be here somewhere.
Let’s wait and see what we get Tick Tock,” she said.
But when she turned around, Tick Tock Turkey was already gone. He had scuttled off to find Clive the Crab, who was still making the final touches to the Hawaiian Milkshakes. He found Clive next to the display table. He was putting cherries on the side of the glass with his crab pincers. When he saw Tick Tock he said “Two hundred and forty, to be precise Tick Tock! Let’s hope there's no more party goers of Egg Island. Or we will have a lot of thirsty listeners.” Both friends started to pour the waste down the drain.
“Let’s just hope the people of Egg Island turn up,” said Tick Tock. No sooner had he spoken than a little rustling came from the trees. It was like the sound of birds cheeping and they had a lot of different sounds to their voices including different types of humming and rustling.
“Sounds like zey are coming!” said Clive, “quick - let’s get ze spread sheet cover on,” and they both made a last-minute tidy to get everything looking nice.
When Tick Tock Turkey ventured back to the boat he saw Future Dog handing out tickets to the locals. They were all of different types and ways and had lots of different ways about them. Tick Tock Turkey was eventually happy and not all together wise with the words he had seen and made. It was all together a shocking sight to see and not all together very wise for him to know of.
[Natasha – that last bit sounds nice but I don’t quite understand what it means!]
Tick Tock Turkey made another slow look around: “Right, I’ll make the announcement then!”
Future Dog smiled, everything seemed to be in order and going to plan. She liked this sense of calm about the boat.
“Ladies and gentleman, kids and pets, it is my absolute pleasure to announce the opening of Egg Island Carnival on sea! I hope you enjoyed the Penguins. We are shortly to have cocktail buffet, where you can enjoy drinks and snacks courtesy of us and hosted by Clive.”
Clive scuttled sideways to Tick Tock. He was waving his pincers and he shouted greetings.
“And then,” said Tick Tock Turkey, gesturing sideways to where Future Dog was standing, “we will have the amazing and talented festival dancers of Honolulu to entertain you! And not to mention our live band: 'Marvin and the Mussels'!”
The entire crowd seemed impressed and they chattered together with what sounded like delight. The whole carnival float boat seemed to buzz with excitement whilst it bobbed on the waves.
Marvin and the Mussels began playing. There were two guitarists and a bass player who looked like mussels with their shiny grey coats, and the lead singer Marvin, who wore shiny grey trousers, swayed back and forth with his saxophone. The festival dancers of Honolulu pranced in with their backwards and forwards Latino hip dancing, and gave a festive rhythm by clapping coconuts in their hands.
The crowd of Egg Island were very much enjoying themselves and one by one they moved towards the moon-shaped dance floor and started their swing dancing. There were couples doing kick steps and side steps. “Come on,” said Future Dog to Tick Tock Turkey, “let’s go Swing Dancing and find a way to swing to our hearts’ content!”
“Off we go! One, two three!”
Boing Boing!
And the pair danced for glee, they were so good people made space for them on the dance floor
It was nearing 10 o’clock and the people of the Egg Island had been dancing for three hours. The festival dancers of Honolulu were preparing for their final grand act…
The crowd saw them moving towards the silver stage that Clive and Tick Tock Turkey had prepared for them. Future Dog was smiling with glee, she had butterflies in her stomach as she was truly nervous for them. They made a formation and then suddenly they started dancing with their garlands, hula-hooping and spinning and twisting and swaying in patterns and shaped and diagonal formations, it appeared effortless... But Future Dog knew it was hard! The whole effect was kaleidoscopic and the dancers themselves were over-joyed to say the least.
Meanwhile, Tick Tock Turkey was taking extra safety precautions with Clive the Crab by tying his pincers together with rubber bands so that he couldn’t accidentally burst the inflatable float, and Percy the plaice was busy making origami napkins.
The band were playing their hearts out, and there was little time left before all the creatures would be together and playing in a nearby field with what they were doing.
The carnival dancers were still spiralling, and the drum beats of Marvin and the Mussels who had started playing slow romantic music as the moon and stars had come out at sea over the island at sea in the blue waters. All the young sweethearts of Egg Island were dancing now with glee.
Suddenly Future Dog felt a spatter of water on her nose. And as she looked up to the sky, and the darkening heavy grey clouds that were forming, she sensed it was going to rain. She turned to Tick Tock Turkey and said, “it's going to rain, what on earth are we going to do? The Carnival float boat isn't that strong!”
“Don't be silly, FD,” said Tick Tock Turkey, but not sooner had he said this when the whole sky began to crack with thunder and the rain started coming down thicker and faster.
“Quick, quick, for shelter!” screeched Clive, “ze canapés!” Together with Percy they put a sheet over the multi-coloured drinks table. “We will have to come back for all of zis…”
Tick Tock Turkey grabbed the cone-like mega phone: “Attention, ladies and gentleman - we will have to take cover, there is an emergency due to a storm overhead. As a measure of caution, I urge you to take any valuables with you.”
The people crowded to one side of the boat in panic. The rain was coming down thicker now... and all of a sudden a huge piece of thunder cracked the middle of the boat down the middle and the whole Island was caught in a state of mass panic.
“AHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!”
They all shrieked together and they were jointly together and unhappy in the secret paths that they had ventured into. What else would they be doing if there was no going back or any other way to show a certain amount of caution. The wind would be on them soon. That much was for certain!
[Natasha - again that paragraph sounds good but the meaning is not clear!]
The boat was rocking back and forth in a state of mass panic, “We are going to drown!” said Tick Tick Tock Turkey.
“We must save ourselves,” said Clive the Crab. “All ze buffet will be ruined. C'est la vie…” he cast his pincers down in despair, ready to drown.
“I know!” said Future Dog suddenly, “we can find a way to see if the penguins will help bring us to shore in the emergency dinghy. Quick Tick Tock - grab this rope here and tie it around the dinghy at the far end. Ok off we go, hey ho!”
The penguins were flapping up and down and clinging on the side of the boat. They were still about because they had rubber arm bands on.
Future Dog called out to them: “You have to help us penguin, and pull the boat to shore to save Egg Island!”
She and Tick Tock heaved the emergency dinghy to the water, and the party people of Egg Island climbed onto the boat. With their brightly-coloured clothes and shoes they looked like a mass of piranhas as they neared the water.
Meanwhile Marvin and the Mussels were still playing, though their music was getting sadder and more tragic sounding.
Clive and Percy were still anticipating the worst and they were hiding under the giant telescope; they couldn't bear to leave the festival carnival float boat. What else could they do? It was of no and little use whatsoever to them… That much was for certain... They could tell.
All the people of Egg Island climbed into the boat down a ladder from the side, relieved to be saved from the storm, and rain still pouring down. Suddenly forty penguins appeared and placed the rope coming from the emergency boat around their tiny little waists. As they swam, the little boat with all ten persons from Egg Island was safely pulled back across the choppy waves to the shore. Luckily, it was not that far.
Tick Tock Turkey and Future Dog sat on the edge of the boat. They could hear the band still playing. “They're mad!” exclaimed Tick Tock. The dancers, who were also good swimmers, had a little raft of their own. They could see them rowing back to shore in their little rubber dinghy.
Suddenly both friends turned to one another: What about Clive and Percy? Where were they?
They couldn't see them on the boat. They both looked sharply back at back at the sinking carnival float in the distance…
Meanwhile, back on the float:
Clive and Percy were sending an SOS signal out to the sky! In tiny little blow-off rockets. They were in a state of panic, still unable to face leaving the boat. What else could they do, but wait and wait and see? What would happen?!
“We are going to perish,” said Percy, who seemed to have forgotten his old sea life under the waves (he had been on Egg Island so long).
Percy suddenly had a second will to survive; he turned to Clive and said, “Let us pop the float and we can travel back in two little round rubber rings... I know there is one left!”
Together they hopped into the round rubber dinghy and before they rowed off, Clive called to the musicians, “Quick! Jump now, for your lives, mes amis! Ze festival float is going down!” And as he said this, he pinched a hole in the side of the float to let all the air out of it. After this, the float began sinking rapidly and they could see Marvin and the Mussels sailing off in rubber dinghies.
“Where did they get those from?” said Percy to Clive.
But Clive had buried his head in his pincers. He was too sad to speak at the loss of the Carnival float he had personally inflated.
When the fish and the crab reached the shore of Egg Island they were greeted by Tick Tock and Future Dog. “You’re alive!” they both said. They were overjoyed to see them. But Clive looked so sad. He turned to Tick Tock and said “Ze Carnival Float and ze Party festival of Honolulu ruined forever!”
“Oh Clive,” said Tick Tock sympathetically.
“Listen, there still might be a chance to keep the party alive,” said Future Dog as she looked up to the sky. It was beginning to clear. “In the early morning light… we could do a festival party finale... what say you Tick Tock?”
“Well yes, but we'd have to make it extra special.. and to cheer Clive up... something to brew up the milkshakes!”
“Well, you haven't used your Time Travelling watch yet, have you Tick Tock?” intimated Future Dog.
“Oh yes! How could I have forgotten?” said Tick Tock, as he looked at his red time-travelling wrist watch.
“I'm going to go back in time and get something truly magical for the festival finale!”
“Great,” said Future Dog as she rushed off to get the festival dancers. When she turned around Tick Tock Turkey was gone. She looked up to the sky and saw a streak of purple and white... “Wherever has he gone to I wonder...?”
But it was pointless thinking about it. Instead she thought she would help to see if Marvin and the Mussels would resurrect their playing and organise a little salsa class to keep the revived partygoers of Egg Island entertained until Tick Tock Turkey would come back with his magic ingredient.
The Festival dancers of Honolulu were busy doing splits and handstands and moving about the beach....
Clive and Percy the Crab were busy with hats and pieces of string all set to different tunes and styles, they could little help themselves now, it seemed.
Future Dog thought she had better practise her Yoga for the day, Tick Tock Turkey would be back any second now.
No sooner had she thought this than Tick Tock Turkey landed right next to her with a thump. He had in his hand a very funny-looking bird, and in his some cocktail sticks!
“All the way from Hawaii!” he squawked. “What think you, Future Dog?”
“I think Clive and Percy will be delighted to see it,” she remarked back. “When you see them you can tell them all about it,” said Future Dog, who was in a funny swan-like position.
“OK, see you later!” said Tick Tock Turkey to Future Dog.
Half an hour later, Future Dog found Tick Tock Turkey with a very happy Clive and Little Percy with a magical drinks and buffet table decorated with Tick Tock Turkey's little sparkling glitter cocktail sticks from 1950s Honolulu.
Suddenly some other dancers she had not seen before appeared and they had little red jackets on and peddle-pusher blue jeans.
“And these are original dancers from the 1950s!” said Tick Tock, “I thought I would keep them for you as a surprise. They really know how to rock ’n’ roll!”
And certainly they did! They swung back and forwards and twirled and across the beach clearing. As soon as they did, Marvin and the Mussels suddenly appeared and began playing their rock ’n’ roll tunes. And of course, the eager party goers of Egg Island soon appeared, grooving and swinging across the expanse of Egg Island to the beat.
And not to mention sipping some of the wonders of Clive and Percy’s fantastic brightly-coloured party drinks with Tick Tock’s dazzling genuine 1950s sparklers.
“Yum yumm,” he said, tasting one, “these are amazing! Here's to the finale of Honolulu on Egg Island ! Tick Tock, bye bye!”
And needless to say the whole of Egg Island danced all night long and through the next day, until it was vibrating and moved the waves of its surrounding waters, impressing the nearby Islands.
