Valuable Information

I know how to make a square cake look like a car, said Baby Pierre. You cut strips off two of the sides and place them at the front and back. Of course they'll be a bit too wide....

Why? asked Lavender.

Maths, said Baby Pierre.

Duh, said Lavender.

So then, said Baby Pierre, you cut the bits off that are sticking out and put them on top of the cake in the middle, to make the high middle part of the car.

How do you stick the pieces together? asked Lavender. With jam?

Yes, with jam, said Baby Pierre.

Gaius and Anoctopus looked at one another in amazement at the cleverness of Lavender and Baby Pierre.

And what do you do next? prompted Gaius.

Icing! shouted Lavender.

And Smarties! cried Baby Pierre. And sprinkles!

What colour icing? asked Anoctopus.

Yellow, said Lavender. Because that's the proper colour for a car.

What a pity, said Anoctopus, that I can't pass all this valuable information back to the person who needs it.

Maybe she doesn't need it, said Gaius.

More Smarties at Home

Would you like a Smartie? I asked Pliny the Elder, waving a plastic bag in front of his nose.

No, thank you, said Pliny, peering into the bag. There aren't any red ones.

Aren't there? I said, affecting surprise.

And they don't look like real Smarties, added Pliny.

They're not. It was a trick question. If you'd said no, I would have asked you if you'd like one of these.

But I did say no.

Yes, and then you offered an opinion which rendered my next question redundant.

I am sorry. And what if I'd said yes?

I didn't expect you to say yes.

I would have said yes, had there been any red ones.

You would? But I thought you had read my poem. I thought it had set you off wondering in what sense the Smarties were real. I thought you had pretty much decided that they were fake Smarties, with a real existence. And I thought that you had been looking for them. And found them. And eaten all the red ones.

No, said Pliny, blandly. You have imagined all that.

Not as Nice

That is a very strange poem, thought Pliny the Elder, upon reading it. Was it that the Smarties had no substance, or was it merely that they were not real Smarties?

He remembered eating Smarties that were not real Smarties. He had come across them inside a chocolate Easter egg, and they had not been as nice as Smarties.

The reason for the not-being-as-niceness was, if he remembered rightly, that the hard shell around the chocolate button had not dissolved in his mouth in the expected way, but cracked into tiny sharp pieces, and that the chocolate, when he had recovered from the shock of that, had been of an inferior quality.

Nevertheless, he thought, I shall take a look around, in case there are any left.