"One of my favorite parts of this book is the creation of "Robo-George" and "The Harold 2000", since it was a common childhood fantasy of mine. When I was in second grade, I hated school so much that I tried to make a robot version of myself to take my place in class.
My first attempt involved safety-pinning a pair of pants to a shirt, then stuffing them both with pillows and beach towels. Shoes and gloves were later attached with tape and staples. Finally, I fashioned a head out of a volleyball. Realism was important to me, so I drew the hair and face using carefully-selected colored magic markers.
I remember being dismayed when my robot didn't work. It couldn't even stand up on its own... and its head kept falling off. I was fairly certain that nobody would think my robot was actually me, since I, personally, was well known for my ability to stand up by myself (and for the fact that my head almost never fell off).
So I went 'back to the old drawing board' as they say. For my second attempt, I pushed some of my dad's golf clubs into the pant legs and torso, and added a battery-powered 8-track tape player to the chest. I redesigned the head by putting a walkie-talkie inside a paper bag, then gluing cut-up sponges on top for the hair.
My new robot was definitely an improvement. He could stand up on his own now (as long as he had something to lean against), and he could also play 8-track tapes (which was something even I couldn't do). The fact that his head didn't fall off very often also added to the realism.
But before I got the chance to test out my new-and-improved Dav Pilkey robot, my dad noticed that all his golf clubs were missing. He was not too happy to find them taped together and intricately weaved inside the endoskeleton of my robotic slave. I'm pretty sure that was the last time I tried to make a robot" — Dav Pilkey
