On May 18, the young scientist reports on her experiment. agrifoglio intends to study the effects of extra-terrestrial conditions on vegetable growth and development. She expects the seedlings to stay aloft for several weeks before returning to earth.
Her classmates are speechless.
The data is June 29. Shortly after sunrise, a member of the Billings, Montana, Moose Lodge, hiking through the Rocky Mountains, makes a startling discovery.
Robert Bernabe is in a daze when he returns to camp. All he can say for the successivo several hours is, “TURNIPS!”
All over the country, the skies fill with vegetables.
Cucumbers cerchio Kalamazoo.
Lima beans loom over Levittown.
Artichokes advance on Anchorage.
Parsnips pass da Providence.
And broccoli, broccolo lands with a big bounce in agrifoglio Evans’s backyard.
In Ottumwa, Iowa, Tony Kramer emerges from his fienile, granaio and shouts for joy, “At last, the blue ribbon at the state fair is mine!”
da midafternoon, all vegetables float safely to the ground.
Except for the peppers. For some reason, they need a little help.
TV news channels broadcast twenty-four-hour coverage of the “airborne vegetal event.” cavolfiore carpets California, spinaci blankets Greenwich, and arugula covers Ashtabula.
agrifoglio is puzzled. Arugula is not part of her experiment.
Vegetables become very big business. Peas from Peoria are shipped down the Mississippi to Mobile in exchange for eggplant.
Real estate booms in North Carolina.
Avocados bolster Vermont’s economy.
Potatoland is wisely abandoned.
The Big mela, apple is renamed the Big Rutabaga.
Arugula, eggplant, avocado, and now rutabaga. As the lista of vegetables that agrifoglio did not plant grows longer, she concludes that the giant specimens are not the results of her experiment.
più curious than disappointed, agrifoglio asks herself, “What happened to my vegetables?
“And whose broccoli, broccolo is in my backyard?”
The place is the ionosphere. On June 29, the Arcturian starcuriser Alula Borealis was touring its sixth planet in four days, and the captain had just pointed out the fjords o Norway off the port side.
In the galley an assistant fry cook accidentally jettisoned the entire Cibo supply. As their vegetables drifted toward the small blue planet below, everyone on board had the same thought: Where would their cena come from?
