It had been years since I had been in any other world besides my own. There was King Arthur’s court many years ago, but now I did not have the slightest idea where I was! As it had happened I was walking up the stairs to my apartment at Warrick Castle when I tripped and fell backwards (or so it seemed) down the stairs and knocked myself unconscious.

When I awoke I was sitting on the side of a hill (a very green one at that) beside a chimney which protruded up from the ground (you can imagine my astonishment, for in my time chimneys came up from houses, not hills)! Since this had already happened to me once before, I decided to find a road and travel down it until I found some sign of civilization.
I had not been walking ten minutes when I found, to my utter astonishment, a young boy sitting on his porch smoking a long and curiously carved wooden pipe! When he saw me his entire face brightened and he rose up and said:
“Mr. Gandalf! How good to see you! Why have you come so early though? In your letter you said you would not arrive until a few days before the party. And yet here you are a full two weeks in advance! Well don’t just stand there! Come in! And sit down!” I followed him inside and something bumped the ceiling as I bent down to go in through the petite door, and I realized for the first time that I had a hat on my head! Not knowing where it came from, I put it on one of the many pegs in the hallway and followed him further into his abode. He bade me sit down while he readied the tea kettle. This entire time he never stopped talking, but went on and on about his birthday party and the Sackville-Bagginses and his nephew Frodo and once again how very surprised yet very happy to see me he was, and how he was looking forward to my showing off my fire-works.
“My dear fellow,” said I and realized that I had a beard. However I pretended not to realize this so as to not deter my words with confusion. “My dear fellow, you must have mistaken me for someone else! For I do not know who it is that you are!”
“Well don’t you know who I am?! I’m Bilbo Baggins! Don’t you remember! You’ve just come for my seventieth birthday! And, you promised to give a good fire-works show!” At this I realized that there was no way out of this one except to go on until I either woke up or dreamed my way out of it.

After I had had tea with the fellow and pestered him about everything I could think of (on the grounds of my being forgetful), I realized that I would actually have to give a fire-works show! I immediately the help of some of the “younger” lads and they gathered all the necessary parts and I at once began to make them.
I made every kind I could think of. From “sparklers” to “boomers”. Even with the two weeks I barely made enough. And when the real Gandalf came there was a bit of a problem. After much disputing, it was decided that whoever the hobbits voted had the best fire-works would be the real Gandalf. Of since we were both “wizards”, we swore to banish the other to another part of the universe for life. He (the real Gandalf) swore by “the flame of Anor”! And I came up with the best words I could think of (since I had heard a little of these and they seemed to be feared), and swore by “the fires of Mount Doom in Mordor”!
At these words, every hobbit shuddered and the real Gandalf yelled at me:
“Begone! Thou slithering serpent of Sauron! Go back to the Shadow!!!” And with that he struck me on the head with his staff and all went black.

When I awoke this time, I was at the bottom of the stairs going to my apartment at Warrick Castle. “What strange things happen to me these days,” I said, and climbed the stairs again. At the top I opened my door and slipped, hitting my head, and all went black again…

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