Curious George

I have a love/hate relationship with the Curious George books. The stories are kind of fun and my kids love them (we have a big book that has six of the books in it, and it's one of the most worn-out/well-loved books in our collection), but I get tired of them really fast and I'm completely exasperated by them sometimes, mostly because they're absurd (which is why kids love them so much) and so many people mooch off of George, especially the man in the yellow hat. I will show you what I mean by summarizing a few of the books and giving them more appropriate titles. (P.S. Don't take this post too seriously, please.)

Curious George
aka The Man in the Yellow Hat Kidnaps a Monkey

In this book George is captured by the man in the yellow hat, who plans to sell him to the zoo. After they get on a boat, a very tearful George is allowed to freely roam the ship. (We won't go into how George's parents felt about their little monkey getting carried off since the book doesn't mention them.) He sees some gulls flying, and since he's apparently never seen birds before (despite having lived in a jungle his entire life) he thinks he can fly too, so he jumps off the ship and almost drowns. Fortunately, the sailors save him and he throws up four whole fish and about five gallons of water. At the man's house George smokes a pipe (!!!) and eats dinner, then goes to bed. The next day he plays with the phone and calls the fire department by dialing 123-4567. When the fire department discovers him, they put him in jail (which firemen are not legally allowed to do, not that anybody gets put in jail for making a prank call to the fire department, but you know . . .). George escapes through a window and then manages to get carried away by a large bunch of balloons, but when the wind dies down he begins to sink and unluckily gets recaptured by the man in the yellow hat, who is relieved that he can still get big bucks selling George to the zoo, but it's okay because a cage in a zoo is such a nice place for a monkey to live after he's spent his entire life in the jungle.

Curious George Takes a Job
aka George Escapes, but then a Lot of People Use him for Free Labor

In this book George escapes from the zoo by stealing the zookeeper's keys and hiding with the elephants until the zookeepers are all gone. After exploring the city, he sneaks into a kitchen to steal some food. Unfortunately, he makes a big mess and gets caught. The cook makes him clean up the kitchen, and then, realizing that this is a very intelligent and efficient monkey, takes George to work for free washing windows with no safety equipment on the outside of a 14 (or more) story skyscraper. Out of the goodness of his heart, George paints a beautiful jungle mural in the nursery of a woman's apartment, and for this act of service he is chased out of the building by five people. To escape from them he jumps off the fire escape and breaks his leg.

When the man in the yellow hat finds out what happened to George, he realizes he could make even more money off of George by making a movie about him, so he tells the hospital that he'll come pick George up after his leg has healed. (He doesn't mention any of this to the zoo, of course, since they would probably want their money back and he already spent it buying a new convertible and a helicopter [it's true--see Curious George Flies a Kite.)

Finally, George's leg is better and the man comes to pick him up. He is almost killed when he smells an open bottle of Ether that the nurse had left on the floor in his room (!?!?!?!?!?!), but fortunately they are able to revive him with a cold shower, and the man hurriedly takes George to the movie studio where George signs a contract he can't read while the man and the studio director smoke cigars (!!!). He plays in the fake jungle at the movie studio all day while the man sits back smugly, looking forward to all the money he's going to get when the movie comes out.

Curious George Rides a Bike
aka More People Use George for Free Labor

In this book George is given a new bike by the man in the yellow hat and then left at home by himself. The newsboy sees George playing with his new bike and convinces George to finish up his paper route so that he can go fishing with his friends at the nearby park (but still get paid for finishing his paper route, of course--it's not bad if George is having a good time, right?). George gets distracted and makes all of the newspapers into boats that float away down the stream (which is pretty incredible--I mean, have you ever tried to really float those things? They get soggy and sink in three seconds!) Then George starts riding his bike again, but unfortunately he hits a rock and the front wheel is ruined. That's okay, though, because George can ride on one wheel, so he heads home doing a wheelie. Then the owners of the animal show see him as they're riding down the street, and they decide to kidnap him and put him in their act (free labor, you know). They fix his bike, dress him up, and give him a trumpet. George almost kills the ostrich trying to feed it his trumpet, but it turns out okay because then he saves the baby bear. The man in the yellow hat shows up to the animal show and is thrilled to find his monkey because he had been worried sick at the thought that someone else was making money off of George instead of him.

Curious George gets a Medal
aka George Floods the Man's House and the Man in the Yellow Hat Thinks of Another Way to Make Money off of George

In this book George spills ink all over the carpet and tries to clean it up with soap and water, but he gets a little carried away and floods the house. He steals a cow and a water pump from a nearby farmer, but the farmer chases him and he has to make a getaway on a museum truck. George explores the museum and ruins a dinosaur exhibit, but it all works out okay because the museum director wants to do an experiment on him and the man in the yellow hat has agreed because the museum director will pay him big bucks for the use of his monkey. George is launched into space and then bails out of the space ship using a parachute. George gets a medal and the man in the yellow hat gets lots of money.

Curious George Goes to the Hospital

I don't really have any objections to this book, but I'm seriously grossed out by the fact that the doctor saved the puzzle piece George had swallowed, and that George and the man in the yellow hat went home and happily put it into the puzzle as if it was no big deal that it had been inside a monkey's BODY for three days. Oh, and everything my kids know about hospitals they learned from this book (and their minor surgeries), and they love to reenact scenes from the book using Ann Marie as their patient.