Phineas L. MacGuire . . . Gets Slimed! by Frances O'Roark Dowell

project.”
    Sarah Fortemeyer, Teenage Girl Space Alien from the Planet of Really Pink Stuff, was taking a carpentry class? My eyes popped open from the sheer surprise of this idea.
    And that’s when I saw what she had done to my room.
    She had turned it into a mold museum.
    She had mounted three shelves to the wall above my desk, and three more above the head of my bed. My mold samples, which now number thirty-seven, lined the shelves.
    â€œI … I can’t believe it,” I stammered. “This is incredible.”
    Sarah shrugged. “Yeah, well, I felt bad when I heard they wouldn’t let you display your mold at school. I knowhow much it means to you.”

    I sat on my bed, stunned. Why hadn’t I thought of this? A mold museum in my very own room!
    It was like a dream come true.
    â€œI guess you don’t want to give me a hug or something, just to say thanks, do you?” Sarah asked.
    I am a scientist. I do not hug Teenage Girl Space Aliens.
    However, I do shake their hands when necessary.
    So now I have decided to revise my goal list for Mrs. Tuttle’s class. Here are my new fourth-grade goals:
    To discover the reason a person would break out in hives just from looking at purple fingernail polish
To use Ben and Aretha’s political influence to make Mr. Reid the principal of Woodbrook Elementary School, since he is the main adult genius there, as far as I can tell
To use the newly constructed Phineas L. MacGuire Museum of Mold to educate people about the many wonders of mold and maybe even make a little extra money by charging a small admission fee
    I was thinking I could use the extra money to build a chemistry lab in my closet.
    I would definitely be the best fourth-grade scientist ever if I had a chemistry lab in my closet.
    Just don’t tell my mom, okay?

MAC’S
SCIENCE
EXPERIMENTS

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    HOW TO GROW
PENICILLIN

    What you’ll heed:
    â€” a lemon wedge
    â€”
dust
    â€”
a plastic bag
    â€” water
    â€” an eyedropper
    â€” a clean, empty milk carton
    How to do it:
    Wipe the lemon wedge across a dusty surface to collect dust on it. When you’ve collected a sufficient amount of dust, drop the lemon wedge into a plastic bag and add five drops of water with an eyedropper. Then plop the bag into the milk carton and seal the carton. After several days, mold should appear on the lemon wedge.
    So what happened?
    The mold that appears on the lemon wedge is called PENICILLIUM. It’s a mold that really likes citrus fruits such as lemons, limes, and grapefruits. As it grows, a liquid called PENICILLIN is produced. If you were working in a fancy science lab, you could transform this liquid penicillin into medicine—penicillin is an antibiotic used to treat sick people.
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    HOW TO
MAKE A MOLD TERRARIUM
    What you’ll need:
    â€”
a plastic or glass container, such as a used, clean mayonnaise jar, with a lid
    â€”
bits and pieces of food (but no meat or fish), such as grapes, bread, cheese, and veggies
    â€”
water
    How to do it:
    Put the food in the jar. Spread it out so it s not all piled on top of each other.

    Spray or mist water over the food and seal the jar up tight. Label your jar so no one mistakes it for a snack (!) and put it in an out-of-the-way spot. After four or five days (maybe sooner) you’ll begin to see all sorts of mold growing on the food. Let it rot to your heart’s delight (or for as long as your mom can stand it).
    So what happened?
    Mold loves moisture and it loves to eat. Unlike other plants, mold can’t make its own food, so it has to find it. Mold breaks down its food by producing chemicals that make the food rot so that the mold can eat it. Yum!
    Please note: When you’re done with your mold experiment, don’t open the jar and let the mold spores escape. They can be harmful to breathe. So dump that mold in the trash—you can always make more.
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    HOW TO GROW SLIME MOLD
    What you’ll