The Newt and the Apple

This story was inspired by an apple I was putting in the girls lunches this morning. It's not very long...

Once upon a time there was a newt named Isaac who was very interested in physics. He used to spend hours mulling over the great, imponderable questions of the time, such as the motion of the heavenly bodies, or whether the chicken came before the egg, or the other way round. He was well known amongst the other physicists of the time, who would treat him with great respect and often referred to him as Sir Isaac.

At night Sir Isaac the Newt would go up to his observatory and train his telescope on the night sky, studying the stars and planets, and writing indecipherable notes on stacks of disorganized notebooks that littered his study. As dawn approached, he would move his telescope to focus on a neighboring farm, and spy on the hens as they performed their morning rituals.

The days, if the weather was fine, Sir Isaac would often spend sitting under a tree, reading and re-reading his notes, or simply lost in thought.

It was on a day such as this that an Evil Squirrel happened to climb the tree under which Sir Isaac was sitting. (Now, my astute reader, you are most probably saying to yourself that it’s a bit redundant to say “an Evil Squirrel”, like saying “a Large Elephant” or “a Wet Fish”. So let us instead say that this was an Especially Evil Squirrel.)

The Especially Evil Squirrel spotted the newt, sitting under the tree, seemingly transfixed, and hatched an Evil Plan. The squirrel found a large apple and rolled it along a branch until it was just above the newt’s head. Then he pushed it over the edge and waited, listening for the thump.

Now you might think that this would be an opportunity for great scientific discovery. But, dear reader, you are forgetting one important fact: Sir Isaac was a newt.

A newt, as you are no doubt aware, is much smaller than an apple. Especially a large apple.

Sir Isaac, I’m sad to tell you, was squashed flat. And, with his untimely demise, so too were lost the many great scientific and philosophical discoveries that he might otherwise have brought to the world.

Only the chickens at the neighboring farm were relieved, for they did not like being spied upon and were happy to regain their privacy.