A Hundred Years Ago

A Hundred Years Ago was a poem written by Rodrick Heffley for an essay that Mr. Huff, the history teacher at Westmore Middle School, assigned. When the power went out at the Heffley residence, Rodrick sold this poem, which he wrote in middle school, for $20,000 in "Mom Bucks," or $200 in real money. Unfortunately, this trade had two consequences; the first was that Rodrick failed the essay due to it being a poem, not an essay, and the second was that Greg paid Rodrick in "fake" Mom Bucks- money he stole from a board game at Rowley's house rather than money he earned. Susan found out and immediately punished the two of them for cheating the system.

Poem

TURING GEARS

Sometimes I sit and wonder
How people made gears turn together
And other stuffs that I don't know
Like who made the first gear who was clever.

Did it take millions of years to complete the invention?
Did they even take a break?
"Crrrrrrr...TING!" It would sound while they ran.
If I don't take a break from gears, I will have a head-ache!

I wish I could interview the ancient Chinese who created them
And see the silver gears that look like small fans
And see them hold hands with their family
As around and around they ran.

Gears are cool
But sometimes, they make you a fool.
A really, really useful tool
A really, really useful tool.

Written by Maheen Thakur, Tokyo, Japanhttps://sites.google.com/site/thakurmaheenpoemscom/

In the movie

Sometimes I sit and wonder

About stuff I do not know

Like, what the earth was like a hundred years ago

Did cavemen ride on dinosaurs?

Did flowers even grow?

Did spiders rule the earth?

Were deserts filled with snow?

There were no books or humans

So how we're we to know

What the earth was like a hundred years ago.

Trivia

• This poem is logically impossible. Rodrick described either scenery that might have happened at the beginning of the Earth, rather than events that happened in the 1900s, or nonsensical things such as "giant spiders ruling the Earth." It would have made more logical sense if Rodrick had titled this poem "A Million Years Ago."
• The poem from the movie is slightly different than this one from the book.