Fabulous Five 024 - The Great TV Turnoff by Betsy Haynes Read Free Book Online

Katie insisted.
    "Well, I won't," said Elizabeth. "And you
were going to name something fun to do besides watch TV, remember?"
    Katie nodded. "Listen, guys. Don't give up yet. Just
give it a little time. You'll think of things to do."
    Elizabeth shrugged and walked away, calling back over her
shoulder, "If I don't think of something pretty quickly, I'm going
straight home to turn on my set."
    "I signed up for the turnoff, and I'd still like to do
it," said Lisa, "but my family isn't interested. My dad wants to watch
the news when he gets home, and then if there's a game on later, he wants to
watch that. My mom has some shows in the evening that she says she has to watch. I either have to sit in my room by myself or be in the living room
with them. I might as well forget about the whole thing now and get it over
with."
    "Can't you explain to your parents how important the TV
turnoff is?" asked Katie. "Didn't you tell them the whole school is
doing it?"
    "That's not true. Laura was telling me about all the
kids who aren't going along with it."
    "There are more doing it than not," argued Katie. "What
about Branford? Do you want them to beat Wakeman? Think of how they'll make fun
of us, after we said we could do better than them."
    "I know," Lisa said, sounding miserable. "But
I can't get away from TV, anyway, so why fight it?"
    Now what am I going to do? thought Katie as she left Lisa
and scuffed along toward The Fabulous Five's meeting place by the fence.
    She glanced around to see Melissa McConnell and Tammy Lucero
talking to Marcie Bee near the gum tree, where the Wakeman kids stuck their gum
before going into school. Katie watched them for a moment, and even though she
couldn't hear what they were saying, she knew what they were talking about.
Marcie had signed a contract to give up TV.
    Jana and Christie were waiting when Katie got to the fence.
    "I've got good news," announced Jana.
    "Great," replied Katie. "I could use some."
    "I talked to Randy," Jana went on. "He said
the guys made rockets at his house on Saturday and launched them yesterday.
They had a great time. The best news for you is that Tony was with them. He
signed up for the turnoff, too."
    Katie felt her spirits rise. "Did Randy say if Tony
talked about me?" she asked.
    "No, but I can ask him if you want me to," offered
Jana.
    "Never mind," Katie answered quickly. If he's
going to be too stubborn to apologize to me, I'm certainly not going to give
him the satisfaction of knowing that I care.

CHAPTER 9
    "How did your weekend go, class?" asked Mrs. Clark
that day. "Did any of you have trouble finding things to do instead of
watching television?"
    "I counted the money I've been saving for a trip to
Disney World and read two books," said Melinda Thaler.
    "Some of us guys made rockets," said Scott Daly. "Then
I tried to see how many push-ups I could do. I got up to seventy-five."
    "Very good," said Mrs. Clark.
    "I wrote on my little brother's feet and stomach,"
bragged Joel Murphy. He looked around impishly when a chorus of laughter filled
the air.
    "You what?" asked Mrs. Clark, looking surprised.
    "Well, actually I copied the Declaration of
Independence on him. I just wanted to see if I could do it. It looked really
neat."
    "I'm sure it did," said the teacher, shaking her
head.
    "He didn't like it when I held him down, though, and he
started crying. My mom got mad and turned on the television to keep him quiet."
    Whitney Larkin frowned at Joel and raised her hand. "Curtis
Trowbridge and I went to the library and checked out a bunch of books. We read
the whole weekend."
    "Very commendable," said Mrs. Clark. "What
about you, Geena?"
    "I wasn't crazy about the turnoff, but I signed up.
Then my brothers had the television on all weekend. I tried not to watch, but
it wasn't easy."
    "Good for you for trying," said Mrs. Clark.
    Others said they had found things to do with their friends
and with their families. A few admitted to sneaking a peek at television.
    Katie