The Story of ‘Bo Ba’

Preface: This is a story I wrote to discourage my kids from ordering boba. It didn't work, so here's the story with some AI-generated images.

Once upon a time there was a Tea and Juice-bar owner named Joe Bofus

Joe lived in the town of Pearl and had run his little store, the ‘Can’t Guess What’s In Your Drink’ juice bar for the past 10 years

Joe was known for making fantastic drinks that were innovative and delicious

Joe was also known for his pets because many of his drinks were named after them

After many years Joe went home for a full summer to visit with his parents

Bo Belly Bofus was Joe’s dad with a rather round and jiggly belly

Julia Jelly Bofus was Joe’s mom and was known for making desserts that reminded her of Bo’s jiggly belly

That summer Julia served up big bowls of Jello every late afternoon

• Yellow Jello with pineapple chunks and whip cream
• Green Jello with limes in a graham cracker crust
• Red Jello with cherries and vanilla ice cream
• Black Jello with Oreos and vanilla frosting

After a long and fun summer, Joe flew home and he had a quick thought that one day he’d include jello into one of his drink innovations.

Upon returning from his summer trip, Joe discovered a Good Eggs box on his front porch

As he walked up to the box and looked down, he saw a dozen bunny rabbits looking up at him

Joe could not leave them and decided to give them away to his employees and best customers.

But he kept one… the smallest and cutest bunny, for himself.  He named this little cute bunny ‘Bo’

Every morning Joe would wake up his new Bunny by saying his name, and he’d pause to watch the bunny’s reaction, and one day the bunny actually repeated his name back

Joe would say ‘Bo’ and Bo would say in a tiny small voice… ‘Bo’

Bo was so cute, and he ate anything and everything Joe would give him

Bo was tiny - the size of the palm of Joe’s hand, and would often snuggle into Joe’s hand to get warm

One day Joe had a crazy idea…  Joe wanted to create a new tea drink and put little round pieces of jello in them

But how could he create small little round pellets of jello?

Well, Joe occasionally served ice cream at his shop, so his first thought was to create a tiny ice cream scooper.

He tried that, but the jello just couldn’t be cut - it would just mush up and would not form into a ball that stayed together

Then Joe tried to freeze jello into little circular shapes in an ice cube tray,

but that didn’t work because the jello just broke when he removed it from the mold

Finally he looked at little Bo and thought

maybe he could feed Bo jello and Bo could create the circular pellets for him!

Joe threw Bo into a bowl of blue jello and told him he would have to eat his way out of the bowl

Bo complied and ate every last bit of jello, but then starting turning red, then blue, then green

Bo didn’t feel good, his stomach was bloated and he began rolling around and burping

Joe held Bo up in the air and looked him straight in the eye, even stared at Bo

Bo stared back and looked like he was concentrating on some primordial task

Bo’s bunny cheeks, which normally were always moving along with his whiskers, stopped moving

Bo’s eyes started to bulge

Joe said ‘Bo’, and Bo said ‘Bo’

Joe said ‘Bo’ again, and Bo’s eyes bulged even more, and…

….oh my something started happening

Bo’s eyes looked like they were going to pop, and finally, 

Bo yelped ‘Bo Ba’ and a pellet of blue jello popped out of Bo’s bottom 

A perfect orb of squishy jello… 

Perhaps too large initially, but once Joe plopped Bo onto a glass jar, for the next several hours, each time Bo said ‘Bo Ba’, 

a little jello ball the size of a tiny marble shot out of Bo 

and plopped to the bottom of the glass jar

And shortly after that day, every time Joe served one of his tea drinks, he would ask ‘Would you like some boba with your drink?’

And that is the story of ‘Bo Ba’