A Gang Of Ravens Came To Lunch o1p3

A GANG OF

RAVENS CAME TO LUNCH

J. NORMAN GRIM & CAROLE GRIM ILLUSTRATIONS BY: MIKE HARDER

© 2020 J. Norman Grim & Carole Grim. All rights reserved.

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ISBN: 978-1-7283-4048-7 (sc) ISBN: 978-1-7283-4050-0 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-7283-4049-4 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2019920763

Published by AuthorHouse 12/19/2019

A GANG OF RAVENS CAME TO LUNCH

(A children’s novel) By J. Norman Grim and Carole Grim

OOPS! – thought the big black bird called Hops Sideways. “What am I doing upside-down?” He looked up toward his feet, and beyond them he saw two very black Ravens. They were—as any sensible Ravens would be— sitting on top of the same branch he was hanging from. So, they were rightside up! Then he noticed more Ravens – and that gang of Ravens was hungry and about to begin a very strange day.

One at a time, each Raven stretched out its wings…then its legs…then its feet. Two of them puffed up the feathers around their throats and began to squawk loudly. Hops Sideways became excited, flapped his wings very hard and finally flipped up so he was on the top of the branch. But!….he had lost the very delicious Pinion Pine seed, usually called a nut, that he had held between two toes all night. He bent his head down and watched the nut tumble to the ground where it seemed to dance for just a moment. This was not a good start for his day, and it was going to get worse.

All the Ravens leaned forward and began to bob up and down—as Ravens often do. They started making lots of funny sounds, and sometimes a very loud and harsh cry – “cawwww.” Below them, on the ground, a cute little brown mouse grabbed the Pine nut. At least part of its breakfast was going to be pretty easy and really delicious!

The Raven’s breakfast was going to be like it had been for many weeks. But lunch would be a quite marvelous feast, full of surprises and a little embarrassing, too.

As they usually did, all of the Ravens flew quickly toward the back yard of the house of the bread people. OK…that is a strange name – but, every night they placed dry bread on a bench in the back yard for the birds and squirrels to eat. By morning, the bread was just a bit too dry for these very fussy Ravens. But, they always picked up several pieces anyway. Off they flew – but only about two blocks away, to soak their bread in a bird-bath at the cute little brown house on Paradise Road. Of course, the last Raven to arrive was Hops Sideways. As usual, he had become lost. Worse for him, the first piece of bread he picked up was moldy and did not taste very good.

The Ravens dropped their bread into the water. Very soon the bread was nice and soft. Really soft! Now the bread slid down their throats very easily.

All this very busy eating was being watched from a distance with great interest. Way too much interest!

Watching all of this was a golden-brown house cat - known in the neighborhood as Little Puma, because that is just what he looked like – a light-brown, but very small mountain lion. He always made the Ravens nervous…..so…..they would eat one piece of that mushy bread, and then twist their heads around in every direction – looking for the cat. They did not want to be Little Puma’s breakfast.

The cat began to crawl, with its belly almost touching the ground. Silently, and licking its whiskers a lot, it came closer and closer to the Ravens. But, poor Little Puma was just a little bit cross-eyed. Because of that, all of a sudden he seemed to be seeing three Ravens for the each one that was really there! So!….for Little Puma, there seemed to be almost 20 Ravens, and all of them were being very noisy and bobbing up and down a lot. This large bunch of Ravens scared Little Puma, and he quickly crawled under a chair in the yard.

With a lot of loud flapping and squawking noises, the gang of Ravens leapt into the air just above the bird-bath and flew out of the yard. Well!, not quite all of them – Hope Sideways was very busy with a nice piece of wet bread and he decided to stay there for just a moment or two longer.

Oh Dear, that was a big mistake! Just then, Little Puma became brave and crept toward the last Raven – yes, our little friend – Hops Sideways. Suddenly, the cat was within a few inches of the Raven and swung a paw at

him so fast that it was hard to even see its paw. It was just a blur! Worse, his very sharp claws, shining like curved silver needles in the sun light, stuck out dangerously. At the very last second, Hop Sideways saw those claws coming toward it, and began to leap into the air…..but, he got off balance and fell into a pretty bed of flowers below the bird-bath. Oops!…..just then, there was a terrible crunching sound.

The cat had struck and he felt something nice and chewy in his mouth. However, Hop Sideways was missing only one black feather from his left wing and, of course…..the cat had that feather clinched tightly in his mouth. As the cat took its first bite of that funny tasting feather, our little Raven friend jumped up, flapped its wings very hard and was three feet in the air almost instantly. He flew just fine even without that one missing feather. Now, he needed to catch up with his family! So, as usual, breakfast had been easy for most of the Ravens. Between breakfast and lunch, this noisy gang of Ravens flew all over the place, snacking on all sorts of things. Often they were seen standing in the road eating a bit of this and that, and very cleverly dodging cars and bicycles. They were a really smart gang, as Ravens always are! When a car came toward Hops Sideways, as you might have guessed, he just………hmm?………hopped sideways.

For just a few minutes, Hops Sideways was having a lot of fun and very busy chasing a little red and yellow beetle around and around an old pine tree. When he looked up, he was quite unhappy to see that his family was gone! But wait!…..he could hear them far off in the distance – sort of talking to one another. They could talk to one another with up to 60 special sounds! Squawk! – squawk! – squawk!…gurgle! – gurgle!….kek — kek! Quickly, he leapt off the ground and followed their sounds – flapping his wings very fast!

Only a few minutes later he was flying over a little store when he saw a cup on the ground. It was one-half full of a dark sweet and bubbly liquid that he had tasted before and he KNEW he loved its taste. We humans know that drink as a cola. He swooped down and grabbed the cup in his rather large beak, and just as quickly leapt back into the air. He flapped and flapped – slowly getting closer and closer to the gang of Ravens. They seemed to be having fun, still chattering loudly and doing lots of acrobatics while flying!

Soon, he was over a lovely park and noticed something moving below. There, he saw a cute and fluffy little rabbit chewing on some grass. But!,…Hops Sideways also spied a long and green animal moving slowly and quietly toward the bunny. Oh Dear!….it was a big snake and it was very hungry. In a few seconds, it was very close to the bunny’s tail and, worse, the snake had its head bent back just a little and its mouth wide open.

Hops Sideways had very good eyes and could even see the snake’s nasty-looking fangs. The snake coiled back a little more, getting ready to strike the bunny. Its forked tongue flicked out and in – tasting the air. It was sure that a nice meal was just seconds away. But at that very moment, a strong gust of wind hit Hops Sideways, and as he rolled to one side, that delicious drink he was carrying spilled out and fell…..down…..down…..down. Maybe you guessed it – SPLAT! – that drink hit the snake on its head. It coiled right around and crawled into a deep hole just behind it. Hops Sideways, who was now our hero, had saved that little bunny’s life! And one snake had a wet and pretty sticky head!

Hops Sideways flew another mile or so, and was still often looking down. Oh!,..oh!…he had such good eyes that he noticed some walnuts that had become ripe and fallen to the ground under their tree. Then he ed that the nuts inside the walnut’s hard shells were very good to eat. They tasted good and would give him extra energy. So, he dove to the ground and picked up a walnut. He pecked at it several times trying to break it open, but that shell on the outside was too tough! Ahhh!, but he was very smart and had another idea. He picked up

the walnut, and flew out over a grassy field that had lots of big rocks in it. Thinking that the rocks might help him break the walnut open, he flew very high and then dropped the walnut. Oh dear!, it just hit the grass in the meadow. As he was flying down to pick it up, a cute little squirrel wiggled out of its hole and raced toward the walnut. That fast little brown and very furry creature grabbed the walnut and was so pleased with itself that it ran around, really fast, in a circle. That felt pretty good and it started a second circle–but then–it thought it had better watch out for that Raven. Well!….then the squirrel did not see where it was going and ran into a bush. Ooops!, that bush knocked the walnut right out of its mouth and the walnut flew several feet into the air. But, just as the squirrel began to get up, it felt something drop out of the bush and right onto its head, then that thing rolled right down its nose…..where it stayed for maybe one second, and then dropped to the ground! It was a group of three little red berries. OH!…oh!….and those berries looked, and also smelled like they might be good to eat. The squirrel ate those very fast. And they tasted very good! Then it saw our smart Raven plunging down toward the walnut – he was there in just one or two seconds and was able to grab that walnut the second time and flew back high into the air. Well!, HA!….let’s that he was a smart Raven…so… he would not try that again!

Very soon, he flew over a road and noticed that a car was coming down the same road. Well, can you guess what happened next? Yes!, he dropped that walnut. It tumbled down and fell right in front of the car. The car ran over the walnut and broke it open leaving the nut laying in the street. And the nut was now in several small pieces. Ever so quickly, Hops Sideways swooped down and grabbed some of those pieces. They were delicious. Oh!—oh!, there was just a little bit too much to eat, but that was not a problem because Hops Sideways stuffed several of those pieces into some little pouches–like sacs–inside its mouth. Ravens often did that. Oh!…..those cleaver birds!!

The rest of his family was now about two miles ahead, and way up in the air. They were having a lot of fun, like ravens often do. They were darting around and doing gymnastics, in the air of course. Rolling over completely, both frontways and sideways. Making a lot of noise — squawking a lot to one-another. And, they were about to have their very own adventure!!

At just about the same time each of the ravens looked down and suddenly became very excited! Way down below they saw a big white food delivery truck parked behind a grocery store. And, they just KNEW it would contain some really good food – in the back of the truck. Oh!…if they could just get inside! They had peeked into several of those trucks earlier this year, and they almost always had good things to eat inside.

Very quickly, five ravens plunged down and flew right into the back of that truck. Yes! — the door had been left open. Just as they had hoped for, it was full of boxes of food. There were loafs of bread and many other types of food. And, they quickly noticed that some things in that truck REALLY smelled very good – very delicious! Right away, one raven tore the plastic covering off of a loaf, stuck its beak in….and began eating. That was delicious! It was quickly ed by two other ravens! They were having a lot of fun eating! Ravens are well known for being very cleaver at opening most boxes that contained food. That was just another way that they seemed to be so very smart!

High up on a shelf was a flat box that had some really good and quite different odors coming from it. Oh!…..oh!…..it smelled like fruit. Two Ravens jumped up there and began to tear into that box. Quickly, they saw that there was a fruit pie inside. And that pie had some white fluffy stuff on its top. The two ravens quickly plunged their beaks inside. It tasted wonderful. Pretty soon, they had pulled that pie completely out of its box. But, oh!—oh!, look out down below, because they ate too fast and it jiggled and wiggled, and tumbled off — plunging down…..down. Oops! - right on top of another raven. That Raven then looked really funny with some of that white fluffy stuff on its head and shoulders. Ah!, but that fluff tasted really sweet and wonderful. Two ravens came right over to help clean-up that raven. That is called preening, and ravens are known to do that to one another quite often. Especially if they are in the same family. And, they often do it while making a soft cooing noise!

Coooo!……..coooo!

Just then, Stephen-G, the owner of the truck, came out and was very unhappy– well!,…ok…..he was actually mad–seeing those noisy ravens having an early lunch. And eating the very food he was going to get paid to deliver to a grocery store. Of course, he yelled at them very loudly and shook his fist in the air. They flew off very quickly, but there was one Raven with a funny looking white coating on its head and shoulders that had a little harder time getting into the air. As it flew, that white fluff began to slide off so that it looked pretty normal in just a few minutes.

Those ravens had to leave the truck way too soon. So, guess what? They were still hungry!

A few minutes later, Hops Sideways FINALLY caught up with his family. Pretty soon, the whole Raven family noticed a table full of wonderful looking food - in many different dishes. The food was sitting in the patio of a beautiful Green and White cottage. No people were there. They were still inside the cottage. Talking and laughing.

Seeing no cats or dogs, the Ravens almost crashed onto the table in a noisy flapping of their big black wings. Each Raven first sat at its own dish. Quickly, they started jumping around and had a lot of fun trying some potato salad, then a bite of sticky cake, a hot dog, and some soft jell-o, which of course, was pretty hard to eat!

Hops Sideways, with great excitement, picked up a hot dog and jumped onto the edge of a punch bowl. But, the hot dog was way too large to swallow, so he tried to bite it in-half. That did not seem to work so he shook it very hard—back and forth—back and forth—trying to break it into two pieces. Well!….he shook much too hard – then he got off balance and fell into the punch bowl. So it seems that one of the Ravens that went to lunch fell in the punch!

Flutter Wings, who was Hops Sideway’s mother, jumped to the edge of the bowl to help him get out. She was bumped from behind by another young Raven who was also hurrying to help. Both of them fell into the punch. Now! – there were three in the punch - - - what a crazy bunch! Of course, the people heard all of the noise and came out of the house to see what was happening. They were not very happy and for just a moment they wondered how a Raven pie might taste. But, they really loved animals of all kinds, so they finally helped the three Ravens out of the punch. The people’s faces and hair had now turned pink. In their excitement, the Ravens had flapped their wings really hard and given everyone a shower of punch. A shower of punch - - - that’s no way to start lunch!

That night, at their usual pine tree roost, two ravens were very busy cleaning their pink, black and sticky feathers. One of the ravens that brought back a hot dog decided to store it and eat it later. Well, that was no problem at all as ravens often just poke any extra food they have into a hole, or under some leaves– hiding it–to gather it up and eat it later. Hops Sideways, however, sat proudly with part of a hot dog still held in his bill. That nice bit of food was not going to get away from him. And a punch flavored hot dog tasted very good, indeed!

The End [Copyrighted — J. N. & C. Grim]