Octavio's Eight Important Things
MINI MINI STORIES
Octavio Octopus woke up one morning with a very busy plan.
"I have eight arms," he said. "I should be able to do eight things at the same time!"
So with one arm, he polished a seashell.
With another, he stacked pebbles.
A third arm waved at passing fish.
A fourth collected seaweed.
And the other four arms also got busy doing very important octopus things.
At first, Octavio felt very clever.
But then things started going wrong.
The seashell slipped.
The pebble tower wobbled.
The seaweed floated away.
And while he was waving, he accidentally splashed himself in the face.
"Oh dear," said Octavio.
Just then, Coralee the seahorse swam by.
"What happened?" she asked.
"I was trying to do eight things at once," said Octavio.
Coralee looked at his tangled arms.
"Maybe eight things are too many," she said.
Octavio thought about that for a while. Then he decided to follow Coralee advice and chose just one thing to do.
He carefully gathered the floating seaweed.
When he finished, he polished the seashell.
Then he stacked the pebbles.
One thing at a time.
By the end of the day, everything was done.
And none of it had fallen, floated away, or splashed him in the face.
Octavio smiled.
Having eight arms was wonderful.
But even an octopus didn't need to use them all at once.
Sometimes doing one thing well is better than doing many things all at once.
