Bob Pflugfelder > Quotes

“Tesla cocked her head to the side.
"Hey," she said. "Do you hear something?"
Nick cocked his head just as his sister had, though he wondered why anyone bother doing that.
Does lifting one ear at an approximately thirty-degree angle really increase one's ability to detect faint noises? he thought. Because he was that sort of kid.”
― Bob Pflugfelder, Nick and Tesla's High-Voltage Danger Lab: A Mystery with Electromagnets, Burglar Alarms, and Other Gadgets You Can Build Yourself

“Oh,” he said, stopping in the doorway. “I should probably warn you. Your beds might take a little getting used to.” “Why?” Tesla asked. “What’s wrong with them?” When Uncle Newt had shown them their room earlier, the beds had looked normal enough. Not that Nick and Tesla had paid much attention to them. They’d been distracted—and horrified—by the posters haphazardly stapled to the wall: Teletubbies, Elmo, Smurfs, Albert Einstein, and the periodic table. (Nick and Tesla had quickly agreed that the first three would “fall down” and “accidentally” “get ripped” at the first opportunity.) “There’s nothing wrong with your beds, and everything right!” Uncle Newt declared. “I’m telling you, kids. You haven’t slept till you’ve slept on compost!” “What?” Nick and Tesla said together. Even Uncle Newt couldn’t miss the disgust on their faces. “Maybe I’d better come up and explain,” he said. Uncle Newt pulled the comforter off Nick’s bed and revealed something that didn’t look like a bed at all. It was more like a lumpy black sleeping bag with tubes and wires poking out of one end. “Behold!” Uncle Newt said. “The biomass thermal conversion station!” Nick reluctantly gave it a test-sit. It felt like he was lowering himself onto a garbage bag stuffed with rotten old food. Because he was. “As you sleep,” Uncle Newt explained, “your body heat will help decompose food scraps pumped into the unit, which will in turn produce more heat that the convertor will turn into electricity. So, by the time you wake up in the morning, you’ll have enough power to—ta da!” Uncle Newt waved his hands at a coffeemaker sitting on the floor nearby. “Brew coffee?” Tesla said. Uncle Newt gave her a gleeful nod. “We don’t drink coffee,” said Nick. “Then you can have a hot cup of invigorating fresh-brewed water.” “Great,” Nick said. He experimented with a little bounce on his “bed.” He could feel slimy things squishing and squashing beneath his butt. “Comfy?” Uncle Newt asked. “Uhh … kind of,” Nick said. Uncle Newt beamed at his invention. “Patent pending,” he said. Uncle Newt was a gangly man with graying hair, but at that moment he looked like a five-year-old thinking about Christmas. Tesla gave the room a tentative sniff. “Shouldn’t the compost stink?” “Oh, no, no, no, no, no! Each biomass thermal conversion station is completely airtight!” Uncle Newt’s smile wavered just the teeniest bit. “In theory.” Nick opened his mouth to ask another question, but Uncle Newt didn’t seem to notice. “Well,” he said, slapping his hands together, “I guess you two should wash your teeth and brush your faces and all that. Good night!”
― Bob Pflugfelder, Nick and Tesla and the High-Voltage Danger Lab: A Mystery with Gadgets You Can Build Yourself ourself

“girders.”
― Bob Pflugfelder, Nick and Tesla's Robot Army Rampage: A Mystery with Hoverbots, Bristle Bots, and Other Robots You Can Build Yourself

“dropped by yesterday, she looked a little put off by the mess. And the”
― Bob Pflugfelder, Nick and Tesla's Secret Agent Gadget Battle: A Mystery with Spy Cameras, Code Wheels, and Other Gadgets You Can Build Yourself

“Whoever had been driving that SUV was still out there somewhere. Their first enemy. Not the “She said my hair looked stupid” or “He cut in front of me in the lunch line” kind. A real enemy. The kind who wants to hurt you … or worse. Nick wondered if he should be mad at his mom and dad for shipping him off into this mess. After a while, he decided it wasn’t their fault. But he’d hate soybeans till the day he died.”
― Bob Pflugfelder, Nick and Tesla and the High-Voltage Danger Lab: A Mystery with Gadgets You Can Build Yourself ourself

“too.”
― Bob Pflugfelder, Nick and Tesla and the High-Voltage Danger Lab: A Mystery with Gadgets You Can Build Yourself ourself

“What in the—? My begonias!” he heard someone say behind him. Nick looked over his shoulder. A small but muscular woman in sweaty workout clothes was stepping out of a big shiny car in the neighbor’s driveway. She was gaping in horror at the chewed-up flowerbed and the smoking lawn mower. Scowling, she turned toward Uncle Newt’s house. And the scowl didn’t go away when she noticed Nick looking back at her. In fact, it got scowlier. Nick smiled weakly, waved, and hurried into the house. He closed the door behind him. “Whoa,” he said when his eyes adjusted to the gloom inside. Cluttering the long hall in front of him were dozens of old computers, a telescope, a metal detector connected to a pair of bulky earphones, an old-fashioned diving suit complete with brass helmet, a stuffed polar bear (the real, dead kind), a chainsaw, something that looked like a flamethrower (but couldn’t be … right?), a box marked KEEP REFRIGERATED, another marked THIS END UP (upside down), and a fully lit Christmas tree decorated with ornaments made from broken beakers and test tubes (it was June). Exposed wires and power cables poked out of the plaster and veered off around every corner, and there were so many diplomas and science prizes and patents hanging (all of them earned by Newton Galileo Holt, a.k.a. Uncle Newt) that barely an inch of wall was left uncovered. Off to the left was a living room lined with enough books to put some libraries to shame, a semitransparent couch made of inflated plastic bags, and a wide-screen TV connected by frayed cords to a small trampoline.”
― Bob Pflugfelder, Nick and Tesla and the High-Voltage Danger Lab: A Mystery with Gadgets You Can Build Yourself ourself

“Don’t worry about it,” said Joe. His conscience was yelling at him not to abandon a couple of kids outside a run-down house with an exploding lawn mower. He needed to leave quick or he might actually listen.”
― Bob Pflugfelder, Nick and Tesla and the High-Voltage Danger Lab: A Mystery with Gadgets You Can Build Yourself ourself

“Nick and Tesla went looking for Uncle Newt. They found him in the same place he’d been the last time they’d looked for him: the master bathroom on the second floor. They’d dragged him out of the shower for help with the rocket—even Tesla, bold as she could be, knew better than to try her luck with a power drill—and he must’ve jumped right back in the second he could. It was understandable, actually. His hair had still been half orange. The bathroom had what looked like a submarine airlock instead of a normal door, and unlike before it was now closed up tightly. When Nick and Tesla pressed their ears to the metal, they could dimly hear the sound of running water and Uncle Newt crooning “Winter Wonderland.” Outside, it was sunny and seventy degrees. “Gone awaaaaaaay is the something! Here to staaaaaaaay is the something! We da-da-da daaaaaa, la-la-la la laaaaaaa! Something in a something booby baaaaaaaa!” “Uncle Newt!” Tesla yelled. “Uncle Newt!” Nick yelled. “Uncle Newt!” they yelled together. “In the meadow we can something-something!” Uncle Newt sang. “And da-something something la-la-laaaaaa! We’ll have something something with the something! Until the who-who ha-has jooby jaaaaaaaa!” “Great,” Nick sighed. “He’s ignoring us now.” “I guess I can’t blame him,” said Tesla. “His hair was still half orange the last time we pulled him out of there.” “Well, I’m starving. Can we go see if the cat left us some cake?” Tesla thought it over, weighing her hunger against the chance of eating cake a cat had licked. She was very, very hungry. “Good idea,” she said.”
― Bob Pflugfelder, Nick and Tesla and the High-Voltage Danger Lab: A Mystery with Gadgets You Can Build Yourself ourself

“Vince stayed behind, blocking the doorway to the girl’s room. He blocked it well. He wasn’t as muscle-bound as Frank, but he wasn’t small either, and there was an intensity about him that seemed to buzz and crackle like an electric current. To Nick, he seemed like the sort of person you could hang signs on. HIGH VOLTAGE
DANGER
BEWARE OF PSYCHO”
― Bob Pflugfelder, Nick and Tesla and the High-Voltage Danger Lab: A Mystery with Gadgets You Can Build Yourself ourself