Mr. Henshaw:

If our TV was fixed I would be watching “Highway Patrol,” but it isn’t, so here are some more answers from my stupid brain. (Ha-ha.)

I do not have any pets. (My teacher says always answer questions in full sentences.) When Mom and Dad got divorced and Mom got me, Dad took Bandit because Mom said that she couldn’t work and look after a dog, and Dad said that he likes to take Bandit in his truck because it helps him to stay awake on long hauls if he has his dog to talk to. I really miss Bandit, but I guess he’s happier with Dad. Like the father said in Ways to Amuse a Dog, dogs get bored if they stay in the house all day. That is what Bandit would do with Mom and me.

Bandit likes to ride. That’s how we got him. He just jumped into Dad’s cab at a truck stop in Nevada and sat there. He had a red bandanna around his neck instead of a collar, so we called him Bandit.

Sometimes I lie awake at night listening to the gas station ping-pinging and thinking about Dad and Bandit hauling tomatoes or cotton on Interstate 5, and I am glad that Bandit is there to keep Dad awake. Have you ever seen Interstate 5? It is straight and boring with nothing much but fields. It is so boring that the cattle in the fields don’t even moo. They just stand there.

My hand is tired from all this writing again. I’ll get to No. 6 next time. Mom says not to worry about the postage, so I can’t use that as an excuse for not answering.

Mr. Henshaw:

Here we go again. I’ll never write another list of questions for an author to answer, no matter what the teacher says.

School is OK, I guess. That’s where the kids are. The best thing about sixth grade in my new school is that if I do my best, I’ll finish it.

I don’t have many friends in my new school. Mom says that maybe I’m a loner, but I don’t know. A new boy in school has to be careful until he knows who’s who. Maybe I’m just a medium boy whom nobody pays much attention to. The only time anybody paid much attention to me was in my last school when I gave the book report on Ways to Amuse a Dog. After my report some people went to the library to get the book. The kids here pay more attention to my lunch than to me. They really want to see what I have in my lunch because Katy gives me such good things.

I wish somebody would invite me to their place sometime. After school I spend time kicking a soccer ball with some of the other kids so they won’t think I am a snob or anything, but nobody invites me anyway.

I don’t have a favorite teacher, but I really like Mr. Fridley. He’s the custodian. He’s always fair about who gets the milk first at lunchtime, and once when he had to clean after someone who got sick in the hall, he didn’t even look cross. He just said, “It looks like somebody’s made a mess,” and started putting sawdust around it. Mom got mad at Dad for making a mess too, but she didn’t mean throwing up. She meant that he stayed too long at that truck stop outside of town.

Two more questions to go. Maybe I won’t answer them. Ha-ha.

Mr. Henshaw:

OK, you win, because Mom is still nagging me, and I don’t have anything else to do. I’ll answer your last two questions even if I stay up all night.

What bothers me about what? I don’t know what you mean. I guess I’m bothered by a lot of things. I am bothered when someone steals something out of my lunch bag. I don’t know enough about the people in the school to know who it can be. I am bothered about little kids with runny noses. I don’t mean I am fussy or anything like that. I don’t know why. I am just bothered.

I am bothered about walking to school slowly. The rule is that nobody should be on the school grounds until ten minutes before the first bell rings. Mom has an early class. The house is so lonely in the morning when she is gone that I can’t stand it and leave together with her. I don’t mind being alone after school, but I don’t like it in the morning before the fog lifts and our cottage seems dark and wet.

Mom tells me to go to school but to walk slowly which is hard work. Once I tried walking around every square in the sidewalk, but that was boring too. Sometimes I walk backwards except when I cross the street, but I still get to school so early that I have to hide behind the bushes so Mr. Fridley won’t see me.

I am bothered when my Dad telephones me and finishes by saying, “Well, keep your nose clean, kid.” Why can’t he say that he misses me, and why can’t he call me Leigh? I am bothered when he doesn’t phone at all which is most of the time. I have a book of road maps and try to follow his trips when I hear from him. When the TV worked I watched the weather on the news so I would know if he was driving through blizzards, tornadoes, hail or any of that fancy weather they have in other places of the U.S.