The Hundred-Mile-an-Hour Dog Goes for Gold! Read online

  JEREMY STRONG

  Laugh Your Socks Off with, The Hundred-Mile An-Hour Dog Goes for Gold!

  Illustrated by Rowan Clifford

  PUFFIN

  Contents

  1. I Have NOT Got a Girlfriend!

  2. Very Fast Cars and Very Fast Dogs

  3. Run, Run, Run – As Fast As You Can!

  4. The Lucky Running-shorts

  5. How to Catch a Frisbee, or Not

  6. More Competition

  7. Pizzas Are a Good Idea

  8. Trevor and Tina Fall Off the Sofa

  9. Guess Who’s on Television?

  10. Another Brilliant Plan – Possibly

  11. Mrs Akani Strikes Back!

  The Last Bit

  Jeremy Strong once worked in a bakery, putting the jam into three thousand doughnuts every night. Now he puts the jam in stories instead, which he finds much more exciting. At the age of three, he fell out of a first-floor bedroom window and landed on his head. His mother says that this damaged him for the rest of his life and refuses to take any responsibility. He loves writing stories because he says it is ‘the only time you alone have complete control and can make anything happen’. His ambition is to make you laugh (or at least snuffle). Jeremy Strong lives near Bath with his wife, Gillie, four cats and a flying cow.

  Are you feeling silly enough to read more?

  BATPANTS!

  THE BEAK SPEAKS

  BEWARE! KILLER TOMATOES

  CARTOON KID

  CARTOON KID – SUPERCHARGED!

  CARTOON KID – STRIKES BACK!

  CHICKEN SCHOOL

  CHRISTMAS CHAOS FOR THE HUNDRED-MILE-AN-HOUR DOG

  DINOSAUR POX

  DOCTOR BONKERS!

  (A Cosmic Pyjamas Adventure)

  GIANT JIM AND THE HURRICANE

  THE HUNDRED-MILE-AN-HOUR DOG

  THE HUNDRED-MILE-AN-HOUR DOG GOES FOR GOLD!

  KRANKENSTEIN’S CRAZY HOUSE OF HORROR

  (A Cosmic Pyjamas Adventure)

  KRAZY COW SAVES THE WORLD – WELL, ALMOST

  LOST! THE HUNDRED-MILE-AN-HOUR DOG

  MY BROTHER’S FAMOUS BOTTOM

  MY BROTHER’S HOT CROSS BOTTOM

  THERE’S A PHARAOH IN OUR BATH!

  JEREMY STRONG’S LAUGH-YOUR-SOCKS-OFF JOKE BOOK

  JEREMY STRONG’S LAUGH-YOUR-SOCKS-OFF EVEN MORE JOKE BOOK

  For my grandson, Sam

  This is Trevor and his dog, Streaker.

  She’s a hundred-mile hurricane on four legs!

  But is she fast enough to go for GOLD?

  1. I Have NOT Got a Girlfriend!

  You’d think Streaker was ill, the way she’s been lying on my bed. Every so often she lifts her head a little, looks at me with the saddest eyes ever, lets her head fall back on the duvet, and groans – HURRRRRRRR. You might even think she was on the brink of death. She would certainly like you to think that she’s dying. Maybe I should call an ambulance. On the other hand maybe I should call a film director – Streaker is such an actress.

  In actual fact I’m the one that’s ill. I’ve got a virus infection. I think every time there’s been anything wrong with anyone in my family our doctor has said: ‘It’s a virus infection.’ Are you limping? It’s a virus infection. Your head’s exploded? It’s a virus infection. I reckon I could be a doctor quite easily if that’s all you ever have to tell anyone.

  Anyhow, I’ve been in bed for three days and haven’t been to school. I’ve had to miss Sports Day so I’ve been pretty fed up. Streaker’s been in bed with me. Well, she’s been on the bed. Every so often Mum or Dad comes upstairs to see how I am. Sometimes they take my temperature and Streaker looks very hopeful. She’d like to have her temperature taken too. Maybe she’s got a virus infection. In fact I think Streaker quite possibly is a virus infection, on four legs.

  It’s quite nice to have her up here with me, but she weighs a ton! It’s difficult to get comfortable when you’ve got a large dog slumped across you, especially as she slowly moves up your body. First she was on my knees. Then she shuffled up to my hips. Several minutes later she was across my chest and just now I dozed off and only woke up because she was climbing on to my head.

  But, boy, am I bored! I play games on my console, but can’t concentrate. I read for a bit, but can’t concentrate. I stare at the ceiling. I wait for someone to visit. Tina hasn’t been here for ages. Tina is my best friend. (NOT girlfriend – just a friend.) She lives round the corner from me and she’s got a dog too. He’s a huge St Bernard called Mouse. Ha ha. Does the dog think that’s funny? I don’t know. Can dogs laugh? Interesting question. These are the kind of pointless things that occur to you when you are lying in bed and getting UTTERLY BORED!

  So there’s no Tina to cheer me up. Instead I listen to Mum downstairs, going nowhere on her cycling machine. Rumble, rumble, rumble. She even managed to crash the other day! How can you crash a gym-cycle?

  ‘I wasn’t looking where I was going, Trevor,’ she told me.

  ‘Mum, you weren’t going anywhere!’

  ‘I think that’s what the problem was. I tried to turn a corner that wasn’t there and fell off. I think I’ve hurt my knee.’

  Poor Mum! Anyhow, it’s probably only a virus infection, says Doctor Trevor.

  So Mum’s downstairs having cycling accidents and when Dad’s around he just watches golf on TV. Golf – The Most Boring Game In The World. I don’t know how my dad manages to stay alive, watching that stuff. Oh look, there’s a little white ball rolling along the ground. Will it go in the hole, or not? Do we care? NO WE DON’T! I think golf would be much more interesting if golf courses were fitted with hidden springs all over the place, and if a golfer treads on one it goes BOYYOINNNGGG! and catapults the golfer across the course instead of the golf ball. It would be much more fun if you had to get the golf player in the hole instead of the ball! But no such luck.

  Meanwhile I’m upstairs being slowly suffocated by a dog. Streaker! I can’t breathe! You are squashing my lungs!

  My mum’s been very busy recently on her bicycle-that-goes-nowhere. She’s been inspired by the International Games, which will be taking place very soon. I reckon my mum believes that someone from the International Selection Committee might spot her through our front window, pedalling for gold, and ask her to join the International team.

  Fat chance! She’ll crash at the first bend. Look what happened when the corner wasn’t even there!

  Anyhow, Mum and Dad are both very excited by the Games and they are getting all worked up about it because in our town we have our very own International athlete. He’s called Kriss Okonjo and he is brilliant at running the 3,000-metre steeplechase. By ‘brilliant’ I mean he can run 3,000 metres faster than anyone else in the whole of the United Kingdom. So that’s pretty fast, isn’t it? And maybe, MAYBE, he might win the International steeplechase and then he will be the fastest 3,000-metre runner IN THE WHOLE WORLD. That’s pretty cool, if you ask me.

  And this is even cooler – we’re going to the Games! We’ve got tickets for the race that Kriss Okonjo is in, and Tina is coming too! It’s going to be SO exciting!

  Anyhow, like I was saying, I was in bed, faced with two choices. I could either die of boredom or die of being suffocated by Streaker. Just then there was a terrible din from downstairs. I thought Mum must have ridden her bike straight into the kitchen cupboard.

  SPLANGG! SQUINGG! CLANKETTYPINGG!

  But it wasn’t Mum at all. It was Tina arriving on her skateboard and thundering at full speed into our rubbish bin. She made such a noise even Streaker managed to lift her head for a few seconds and then – HURRRRRRRRR! – big sigh, and she dropp
ed back to the bed.

  Then there came the THUD THUD THUD of Tina taking the stairs two at a time. BANGGG! My bedroom door burst open and Tina exploded into the room, yelling.

  ‘InternationalsandeveryonethewholetownsaysinpaperandcanalltakepartforanimalsandMouseweightliftingandgoldmedalsandeverythingsbrilliantfantasticexcitedMumsays!’

  ‘Could you say that again?’ I asked quietly.

  So Tina took a deep breath and –

  ‘Internationalsandeveryonethewholetownsaysinpaperandcanalltakepartforanimalsand–’

  ‘SLOW DOWN!’ I shouted. ‘Tell me s-l-o-w-l-y.’

  Tina sat on the end of my bed and grinned. She’s got a grin like sunshine. It always cheers me up.

  ‘You know our local newspaper? It says that the town council has decided to celebrate the International Games by holding their own International Games, right here, in our town.’

  That seemed very strange to me. ‘But, Tina, hang on, surely all the athletes will be at the real International Games,’ I pointed out.

  Tina rolled her eyes as if I was being blindingly stupid. ‘It’s not for athletes, you idiot. It’s for animals.’

  ‘ANIMALS?’ My mind boggled. It had never done so much boggling. It had almost boggled right out of my ears. I was already imagining elephants going for the long jump and whales bouncing off diving boards.

  ‘Yes,’ beamed Tina. ‘It’s going to be an Animal Games for pets from our town. My mum says Mouse can take part. Streaker could too!’ She reached out and patted Streaker’s head. ‘Just think, Trevor, Streaker might get a gold medal. She could become a doggy Kriss Okonjo!’

  The doggy Kriss Okonjo lifted her head for a moment and gazed at Tina with melting eyes. Her head slumped back on to the bed and she groaned. ‘HURRRRRRRRRRRRR …’

  2. Very Fast Cars and Very Fast Dogs

  Maybe I was getting better anyhow, but Tina’s visit really perked me up. And, when I perked up, Streaker did too. Tina whizzed off home to grab the newspaper and came scooting back, crashing into the refuse bin AGAIN.

  Mum came out to see what all the noise was about, just as I wandered down the stairs.

  ‘Oh, it’s you, Tina,’ said Mum. ‘Do you have to make so much noise on arrival?’

  ‘Hi!’ Tina beamed back at my mum. ‘How’s your knee?’

  ‘It’s a virus infection,’ I shouted down the stairs. They both looked at me as if I was mad. ‘Just my informed medical opinion,’ I shrugged.

  Mum rolled her eyes and changed the subject. ‘Trevor – you’re up. You must be feeling better. Three days off school and now you’ve got half-term ahead of you as well and suddenly you’re better. Hmmmm. Some people might be suspicious.’

  ‘Mum, I’ve been ill. You know I have. Anyhow, Tina says there are going to be Animal Games in town. Have you read about it? Streaker could take part.’

  Streaker looked at us with shiny eager eyes. At least they looked eager and shiny to me.

  But Mum was aghast. ‘Streaker? Take part? Trevor, that dog of yours has never done a single thing that’s been asked of her. She is completely untrainable. A carrot is more obedient than that dog.’ And Mum went humphing off with her eyebrows somewhere around the top of her head in utter disbelief at the state of things, especially Streaker – and me.

  Actually, it’s interesting that whenever Streaker does something BAD then she is MY dog. When she does something clever (and I admit it’s usually by pure chance that this happens), but, WHEN she does do something clever, suddenly Streaker is OUR dog, according to Mum and Dad. Anyhow, since when has anyone tried to train a carrot to do anything? Have you ever seen a carrot mowing the grass? Ever seen a carrot reading the news on TV? Of course not.

  Tina and I went through the newspaper, looking for information. The organizers had invented a whole series of animal games. For example, there was showjumping for horses and rabbits (separate events).

  ‘Rabbits don’t go showjumping!’ I exclaimed, but Tina nodded and said that her cousin, Archie, had a jumping rabbit. ‘And he’s really good at it,’ she added. ‘He’d be great at showjumping.’

  ‘Hey, look at this!’ I yelled. ‘This is perfect for Streaker – discus for dogs. Only the dog doesn’t throw the discus – it catches it! Someone throws a frisbee and the dog has to catch it. I bet Streaker could do that. What are you going to enter Mouse for?’

  Tina frowned. ‘Shaggiest dog? Laziest dog? Fattest dog? Heaviest dog? Dog-that-doesn’t-move-the-longest dog?’

  I nodded. ‘He’d win all those.’

  We scoured the list of events. There was dog racing – which was perfect for Streaker. There was wheel-racing for hamsters, maze-running for rats, a donkey tug o’ war and a highest climb for cats. There was even a stay-still-the-longest contest for stick insects.

  And then I saw it. Skateboarding for dogs.

  ‘Tina – this is perfect for Streaker! Look!’ I showed her the paper.

  ‘Skateboarding? When did Streaker last go skateboarding?’

  ‘She hasn’t. But we can teach her. We’ve got time.’

  Tina still needed convincing so I went on. I reckoned a bit of flattery might help.

  ‘You’re pretty good at skateboarding. You could help me. You’re brilliant.’

  Tina gave a little smile. ‘Not really,’ she began.

  I nodded emphatically. ‘Yeah – you really are. You can do all those tricks and stuff.’

  ‘What tricks?’ she asked.

  I was about to say like crashing into rubbish bins, but I knew that would be a big mistake. I grinned and said, ‘I think your best trick is probably not falling off.’

  Tina laughed and punched me playfully. ‘You!’ she said and gave me THAT LOOK.

  Uh-oh. Danger! I backed off hastily. You know what I mean by THAT LOOK, don’t you? It’s the one where a girl’s eyes go all heart-shaped and soppy. Like I said just now, Tina is JUST A FRIEND. Unfortunately, she has other ideas! So I smiled brightly and suggested we started straight away.

  ‘We’ll have to get her used to being on a skateboard first of all. I’ll tie this bit of string to the front and then we’ll pop Streaker on-board and tow her along.’

  It sounded dead easy. It looked dead easy too. Put the dog on the board, pull her along. Simple-pimple. Ha ha! How wrong could I be? I should have known Streaker would play up. She just did not want to get on-board. I’d put her on, she’d jump off. I’d put her back and she’d jump off. Put her on. Jump off. On, off. On. Off.

  Finally we just stared angrily at each other. Tina suggested supergluing her paws to the board. Obviously she didn’t mean it, but it certainly would have helped. And then, while we were standing there scratching our heads, Streaker climbed on to the board, slumped down, lowered her chin and went ‘HURRRRRRRRR’, in that sad way of hers.

  ‘It’s better than nothing,’ I told Tina, and grabbed the string. We set off along the pavement, with Streaker looking as if she was fast asleep. Round the corner we went and who should be coming in the opposite direction?

  Charlie Smugg. Charlie Smugg AND his three Alsatians AND his girlfriend, Sharon Blenkinsop. They were blocking the pavement. We would either have to go through them or out into the busy road and round them.

  Charlie came up close and stopped. He’s an ugly mug, that’s for sure – an ugly, very spotty mug. He’s fourteen and heavily built, like his dad. (I don’t mean his dad’s fourteen as well. I mean they’re both big. Charlie’s dad is the local policeman – Sergeant Smugg.)

  ‘Look who it is,’ smirked Charlie. ‘It’s the two little lovebirds.’

  That was pretty rich coming from Mr Smarmypants-who-we-caught-kissing-his-girlfriend-once. Not that I could say that to him. He would have killed me.

  Sharon giggled, wrinkled her nose and repeated it. ‘Lovebirds!’ she sniggered, while Charlie’s Alsatians tugged at their leads and snarled at Streaker.

  Streaker wasn’t bothered. She knew she could outrun those Alsatians any day.

 
Charlie spotted the newspaper Tina was carrying.

  ‘You ain’t gonna take part in them Animal Games, surely?’ he demanded. ‘I wouldn’t bother if I were you. Sharon and me – we’re gonna clean up. Gonna win everything.’

  ‘You can’t win everything,’ Tina pointed out. ‘You haven’t got enough pets.’

  ‘I’ve got three Alsatians,’ he snapped back.

  ‘Streaker’s faster than your Alsatians,’ I said.

  Charlie knew this was true because they had chased Streaker once and she got away – easily. But Charlie just smiled.

  ‘Maybe,’ he sneered. ‘But Sharon here – she’s got a greyhound. An ex-racing greyhound. It’s won medals an’ everything. Know what he’s called?’ Charlie leaned forward and almost spat the name at us. ‘Lamb.’

  Huh! What was so special about that? Charlie nodded emphatically and his sneer grew even more sneery.

  ‘Want to know what that’s short for? Eh? Lamb? Wanna know, do you?’ He leaned forward again. ‘Lamborghini. Yeah. Understand now, do you? Lamborghini. That’s a car, that is. Very fast car. That’s why the dog’s called Lamborghini, cos he’s a very fast dog. A great deal faster than that snotty mutt of yours there.’

  We all looked down at the skateboard. Streaker opened one sleepy eye for a moment, shut it and went – ‘HURRRRRRRRRR’.

  3. Run, Run, Run – As Fast As You Can!

  I had been looking forward to the Animal Games until we bumped into Charlie. He’s always BAD NEWS, if you ask me – a bit like a nasty virus. Maybe that’s Charlie’s problem. He’s a walking virus.

  Anyhow, the weekend came and Tina and I were on dog-walking duty. Actually, Tina and I are on dog-walking duty almost every day. I think that’s why parents have children – so they can do the jobs parents don’t want to do themselves. You know – mow the grass, walk the dog, feed the cat, wash the elephant. OK, maybe not the elephant, but I bet if your parents really did have an elephant you’d be the one who had to wash it, cut its toenails and polish its ears. It’s a good thing I like animals, that’s all I can say. I’m just a slave really.