On May 18, the young scientist reports on her experiment. 冬青, 冬青树 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 日期 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 下一个 several hours is, “TURNIPS!”
All over the country, the skies fill with vegetables.
Cucumbers 圈, 圈子 Kalamazoo.
Lima beans loom over Levittown.
Artichokes advance on Anchorage.
Parsnips pass 由 Providence.
And 西兰花 lands with a big bounce in 冬青, 冬青树 Evans’s backyard.
In Ottumwa, Iowa, Tony Kramer emerges from his 谷仓 and shouts for joy, “At last, the blue ribbon at the state fair is mine!”
由 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.” 菜花, 花椰菜 carpets California, 菠菜 blankets Greenwich, and arugula covers Ashtabula.
冬青, 冬青树 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 苹果 is renamed the Big Rutabaga.
Arugula, eggplant, avocado, and now rutabaga. As the 列表 of vegetables that 冬青, 冬青树 did not plant grows longer, she concludes that the giant specimens are not the results of her experiment.
更多 curious than disappointed, 冬青, 冬青树 asks herself, “What happened to my vegetables?
“And whose 西兰花 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 或者 Norway off the port side.
In the galley an assistant fry cook accidentally jettisoned the entire 食物 supply. As their vegetables drifted toward the small blue planet below, everyone on board had the same thought: Where would their 晚餐, 晚饭 come from?
