Maple's Theory of Fun
By Kate McMillan and Ruthie Prillaman
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About this ebook
Sixth grade has been pretty disaster-free for aspiring astronaut Maple McNutt—which is impressive, given the number of worries and possible catastrophes that run through her head every day. (So far, Earth hasn’t been devoured by a black hole and a cockroach hasn’t crawled out of her toothpaste mid-squeeze. Phew!) But then her best friend of seven-point-two years, Sunny Gwon, accuses her of being unfun and starts hanging around with a new group of friends.
In order to win Sunny back, Maple decides to undergo a serious scientific transformation to become fun by 1. Doing extensive research, 2. Applying research to self, and and 3. Repeating until fun. It’s risky and groundbreaking research, but Maple has no choice if she wants to save her friendship.
Kate McMillan
Kate McMillan grew up in Houston, Texas, illustrating and writing stories in the world’s tiniest font. She studied architecture at Yale and boatbuilding in Norway before making her way to Los Angeles to start a career as a concept artist in animation. She has worked for studios including DreamWorks and Disney TV, where she gets to make up worlds every day. In her free time, she enjoys building furniture, scouring the sidewalks of LA for scraps to build said furniture, and drawing wobbly buildings that look like they might fall down.
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Maple's Theory of Fun - Kate McMillan
Saturday, 5:28 p.m.
Space Center Houston: front lawn.
There’s a 99% chance that today will be the BEST day of my life.
In T-minus 62 minutes, my best friend, Sunny, and I will be shaking hands with a real NASA astronaut. And not just any astronaut but objectively the coolest, smartest, most competent astronaut who has ever existed on Earth (I can’t speak for undiscovered exoplanets):
Inspiring and informative fact #1: Jackie Grand has piloted 11 space flights, completed 7 space walks, and collected over ONE THOUSAND intergalactic dust particles.
She’s signing autographs at the NASA Fun Fair for a whole 45 MINUTES, even though she definitely has a jam-packed training schedule before her next mission.
Inspiring and informative fact #2: Jackie Grand 3D-printed the first pizza in space. Flavor: cheese.
I know that if I don’t have an airtight plan, I’m going to say something stupid in front of Jackie, or worse, freeze up and say nothing at all like I sometimes often do. Fortunately, Sunny and I came up with Operation Airtight Plan, which is just our way of saying we wrote a speech in advance. Well, I guess I wrote all of it, but the point is, we’re going to say it together.
OPERATION AIRTIGHT PLAN
(DO NOT THROW AWAY)
Sunny: Greetings. Jackie Grand. (Shake hand.) My name is Sunny Gwon, and this is my bes+ friend and scientific collaborator:
Maple: Maple McNutt.
Sunny: It is an honor and a privilege to stand in your presence. Maple wants you to know that you are pretty much the entire reason that she wants to be an astronaut when she grows up. find why she has attempted multiple times to make a pizza on her dad’s 3D printer.
Maple: It’s true.
Sunny: Maple also wants you to know that she watched your ScienceRocksRadio interview on YouTube, and it inspired her to request a journal EXACTLY like yours for Christmas, which she received. It even has graph paper like yours, which is essential for recording FACTS.
Maple: find drawing ACCURATE diagrams.
Sunny: I would be honored if you would give me a high five so that I may high-five a hand that has gone to space.
Maple: Whereas I would be honored if you would please sign your autograph right here very neatly.
Sunny and Maple: Thank you. (Hand over journal.)
I feel way better about the speech since Sunny’s doing it with me. He should be here any minute.
5:40 p.m.
I texted Sunny (actually his dad because Sunny doesn’t have a cell phone yet):
One… two… three… maybe he meant one MINUTE away.
5:43 p.m.
Now it’s been exactly THREE minutes. I’m starting to wonder if something happened. Maybe they got a flat tire?
5:44 p.m.
Or maybe they parked next to the roller coaster the exact second it derailed and the roller coaster car smashed into Mr. Gwon’s sunroof? I’m looking up whether that’s even possible.
5:46 p.m.
Okay, according to an extremely legitimate website SPECIALIZING in theme-park disasters, it’s not very likely. But not impossible.
5:47 p.m.
My mom asked why I’m sitting by myself, doodling,
instead of being first in line to meet Jackie. She pointed out that some of my other friends, like Mahogany Perez and Ovi Nagar, are already lining up. I told her, yet AGAIN, that I have to wait for Sunny to execute Operation Airtight Plan, which won’t be so airtight if he did in fact get smooshed by a derailed roller coaster.
Also, I’m not doodling.
I’m drawing accurate diagrams.
5:50 p.m.
My mom keeps looking over my shoulder at my phone.
I should mention that my mom works in the NASA PR department, planning educational events for Rocket Grrls, a club that’s supposed to get girls excited about science.
My mom set up this paint-your-own-rocket booth because she FALSELY believes that girls won’t be interested in space exploration unless she slathers every rocket in pink sparkly paint.
I told her for approximately the twelfth time that sparkles would be disastrous in zero gravity because debris as small as one millimeter can severely disable subsystems on board a spacecraft. She said I need to take a deep breath and have fun.
You know what? I’m not going to let it bother me. Not on the best day of my entire life. I wonder if Jackie Grand has entered the premises.
I’m also wondering if Sunny’s alive.
5:57 p.m.
Ugh. Jared again.
Sunny and I started sixth grade this year at a new middle school that has a special science program. I was kind of nervous about meeting a bunch of new kids that I didn’t know from elementary school or preschool or NASA day care (where Sunny and I met as babies). Fortunately, most of the other kids are really nice and/or smart.
Unfortunately, there’s also Jared Grody.
I really wish Sunny wouldn’t carpool with Jared. Jared has NO RESPECT for getting places on time, or for anything, really. He’s in computer science with us, and all he does is draw butts in DigiPaint. Jared even got Sunny to participate in the butt painting, which caused Sunny to get his first B+. Mr. Gwon and I were not pleased.
6:06 p.m.
6:10 p.m.
6:13 p.m.
We’re in line! Sunny and I are going to run the speech one to three more times. Jared went off to ride the roller coaster, thankfully.… Maybe it will get stuck upside down for the rest of the night. Or, no, I take that back—I don’t want the blood to sink to his brain and his head to explode. Taking it back!!
Despite my facts about the dangers of glitter, my mom still let Sunny take a whole bottle from the paint-your-own-rocket booth so we could sparkle up the evening!
I think my mom is a bad influence on Sunny.
6:15 p.m.
Sunny just poured glitter in my hair.
Yes, he did. I’m no longer permitting Sunny to record mistruths in this journal.
I can’t let Jackie see me like this, even if Sunny says I look mega-fancy
with glitter hair. Picking out each glitter particle as we speak.
6:18 p.m.
Operation Airtight Plan is ready to go. I’m only about 36% nervous now that Sunny’s here. I hope I make a good impression on Jackie so that when we one day become colleagues in space (hopefully), she’ll remember me fondly.
6:22 p.m.
Ugh, Jared just showed up in line. I guess the roller coaster didn’t get stuck. He said he saw a girl further up with the longest ponytail he’d ever seen. Specifically one billion feet long,
which is highly unlikely, given that the world record is 18 feet. (I looked it up.) Jared clearly doesn’t believe in FACTS.
Jared tried to convince Sunny to get out of line and go get dino nuggets instead of waiting and waiting to meet some lady.
… SOME LADY???
Inspiring and informative fact #3: Jackie Grand went to the Olympics for jujitsu and came in fourth place. Which means she could 100% kick Jared’s butt extremely hard if she wanted to. (Which she wouldn’t. She obeys laws.)
I almost told Jared that, but then Sunny stepped in.
One of the WORST things about Jared is that he makes Sunny act all weird and say stuff that I don’t think he really means. For example, why would Sunny call meeting the most important person in the world this random thing,