The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume 559

"I've finally completed my masterpiece," Mogey announced, staggering out of the broom closet in a haze of dry bubblegum fragments and chocolate milkshake residue. A crumpled, greasy manuscript was clutched in his hand. "I've written a book of World War I poetry!"

"Say," Smush responded, "aren't we supposed to live in a time before World War I?"

"Probably," Mogey said, "but it doesn't take a rocket scientist to predict a world war will occur at some point in the future, or to imagine what it will be like."

"Yeah, we also live in a time before rockets," Smush added, "but I guess that's besides the point. Let's hear some poetry, then."

"Alright - this one really sums up the tone of the entire book. It's called Fluffy the Bunny's French Countryside Ice Cream Picnic."

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume 558

Scarcely a week passed when Mogey and Smush would not find themselves in the offices of FP Werthersoriginals, the director of the local theater. Mogey and Smush were dying to be in show business, but FP Werthersoriginals roundly dismissed every idea they came up with.

"We're back, Mr. Werthersoriginals," Smush declared as they strode into the office once again, "despite the fact that Mogey cried for an entire week when you said our two-man band was 'filthy - and not in the good way.'"

"It's true," Mogey added. "And that wasn't even as painful as the time you started firing warning shots from your revolver during our laser light show demonstration."

"Well, get on with it then," FP Werthersoriginals said, stroking his moustache and wondering what sort of beast's leg he'd like to have for lunch that day.

"We call this: Puppet Time with Soggy & Mush," Smush announced. He and Mogey pulled socks onto their arms and began using their hands to approximate two snake-ish creatures discussing the Dewey Decimal System.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa," said FP Werthersoriginals. "Whoa. Those are your puppets? A couple of gym socks? For serious? Didn't you even want to slap a pair of googly eyes on them?"

"Let's get out of here, Mogey," Smush said haughtily. "It's clear that, once again, FP Werthersoriginals doesn't understand true art."

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume 557

One dark and moonless summer afternoon, an ominous knock sounded on the front door of Mogey and Smush's Academy for Gifted Checker Players.

"May I help you?" Smush asked, opening the door to reveal a chubby man wearing a mask and a wide-brimmed black hat.

"Yes," the man replied. "My name is Fat Zorro. May I please have a cinnamon bun?"

"I'm afraid not," Smush rejoined. "We only have enough cinnamon buns here for our students to eat one apiece, and for Principal Mogey and I to have three."

"Tell you what," Fat Zorro said. "I'll play you in checkers for it."

"P'shaw," Mogey said.

"Laughable," Smush added.

Ten minutes later, Fat Zorro was dashing out of the school as fast as his meaty legs could carry him, six cinnamon buns impaled on his sword and the students' cheers ringing in his ears.

"You cheat!" Smush called after him. "You scoundrel!"

"You can take those double and triple jumps to your grave with you, Fat Zorro!" Mogey shouted. "We don't play that way at Mogey and Smush's Academy for Gifted Checker Players."

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume 556

"Pine straw is just as good as regular straw, I tell you!" Smush said. "I read it in a technical document of some kind!"

"There's no way!" Mogey insisted. "It's all piney and gross."

The reason Mogey and Smush were debating the merits of pine straw is that their neighbor, Phil the Farmer, had tasked them with taking care of his cow while he went to Jamaica for the week. For their help Mogey and Smush would have all the cow's milk, plus six golden coins as long as they didn't eat any portion of the animal.

But Mogey and Smush had run out of straw to feed the cow on Day 2, and now they were scrambling to find an apt substitute. With no other ideas, they hauled a wheelbarrow full of pine straw back to Phil the Farmer's barn and began pitching it into the cow's feedbasket to see what he would do.

"Excuse me," the cow said, "is that pine straw?"

"Yes," Smush replied.

"I can't eat pine straw," the cow said. "It's poisonous."

"Ha!" Mogey shouted. "Told you!"

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume 555

One afternoon, Smush came home with a newborn baby squirrel tucked into his lunch pail.

"I hope you don't expect me to eat that for dinner," Mogey said warily. "I had squirrel for lunch today."

"He's not for dinner!" Smush said, reflexively hugging the lunch pail closer to his chest. "I thought he'd make a nice pet."

"That wouldn't be so bad, I suppose. What are you going to name him?"

"I was thinking 'Samuel.' He looks like a Samuel, doesn't he?"

"Samuel?" Mogey asked incredulously. "Do you know what that name means?"

"No, what does it mean?"

"It means," Mogey replied, lowering his voice so Samuel wouldn't hear, "little stinky skunk man."

"That is not accurate," Smush said.

"Alright, alright, I admit it," Mogey answered. "It actually mean big stinky skunk man."

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume 554

It was not safe to be out after dark in Mogey and Smush's township because of the Mighty Walloping Honkersanz, a creature so monstrous he would eat you up without even having an hors d'oeuvre first. In the wee hours of morning, you could hear his honking war cry as he searched for tasty people who strayed outdoors.

To the Mighty Walloping Honkersanz, Mogey was the equivalent of a fried macaroni-and-cheese ball, and so he was horrified to awake one night in the middle of the street, having apparently sleepwalked straight out the front door. More frightening still, he could hear an awful honking noise coming toward him.

Mogey whirled around and sprinted for home, only to twist his ankle on an old slice of eggplant parmesan lying in the road. He knew it was too late – the Mighty Walloping Honkersanz was already upon him. Mogey squeezed his eyes shut and waited for sweet honking death to claim him.

“Hi there, Mr. Mogey.”

“Wha-what?” gasped Mogey, opening his eyes. Standing in front of him was Royal Pantsbottom, the neighborhood paperboy.

“You’re awake awful early today,” Royal Pantsbottom said, honking his bicycle horn.

“That horn,” Mogey stammered. “I always thought your horn was the cry of the Mighty Walloping Honkersanz!”

“Oh,” Royal Pantsbottom said. “Didn’t you ever notice that my honking was always followed by the sound of a newspaper landing on your front porch?”

"I always thought that was the sound of the Mighty Walloping Honkersanz putting down his Fearsome Widowmaking Briefcase," Mogey replied.

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume 553

"You know, Mogey, I don't even know why I bother raking the leaves with you," Smush said one fall afternoon that was not crisp. It was anything but crisp.

"Why's that, Smush?" Mogey asked, sweeping his wooden rake carefully along the ground. "There's nothing you love more than an orderly front lawn."

"Very true. But every time we've ever raked the leaves into a pile, you haven't been able to resist the urge to jump in and undo all our hard work."

"Now that's just not fair," Mogey retorted. "I did no such thing back in the fall of '26."

"Yes, but that's only because you had a broken leg at the time," Smush said. "And you still managed to scatter the leaves about by rolling your wheelchair through the pile half a dozen times!"

Just then the urge to leap into the pile overcame Mogey, and he took a running dive into their newly formed heap of leaves, splashing them to the far corners of the yard.

"What was that?" he asked, looking ever-so-slightly guilty as he emerged from what used to be their pile. "I couldn't quite hear you."

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume 552

It seemed that Mogey never could catch a break. Boredom plagued him one rainy Sunday morning until he managed to track down a book that seemed interesting. But when he finally settled down in his easy chair to start in on Adventures in Toastmaking, the book seemed to have other ideas. Every time Mogey opened the cover, the book would sprout arms and legs, hop down from his lap, and run full speed until it crashed into a wall.

"Why in the world is this happening?" Mogey shrieked in frustration after the book had escaped for a third time.

"Why is what happening?" Smush asked, sticking his head into the room.

"Adventures in Toastmaking keep growing arms and legs and running away from me!"

"Well," Smush replied, surveying the situation carefully, "you are eating cheez curlies. If you tried to touch me with your fingers all covered in that weird orange dust, I'd probably run away too."

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume 551

Mogey strode into the 73rd annual FancyPants Gala & All-You-Can-Eat Buffet feeling pretty darn schnazzy. His hair was combed, he had on a pair of extra-shiny shoes, and he was about to rub shoulders with the most powerful lords, ladies, and possum-barons in the countryside.

"Hey there, Smush. This is some shindig, eh?" Mogey said when he encountered his pal, who had come straight to the event from his racquetball match.

"Sheesh, Mogey, spin your top, will you?" Smush replied, rolling his eyes.

As it was Mogey's first trip to the FancyPants Gala, he assumed this was a custom of the event, deferring to Smush who was a veteran of such affairs after attending the prior year. So he pulled out the small spinning top he always kept in his pocket for good luck and gave it a good twist on the buffet table.

"No, Mogey," Smush urged quietly. "I mean, turn your top around!"

Mogey seized the top and spun it even more forcefully, accidentally propelling it into a large bowl of prawn pancakes.

"For the love of muffins, Mogey!" Smush whispered in exasperation. "I mean turn your shirt around! It's on backwards - I don't even know how you were able to button it up that way!"

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume 550

"Psst, Mogey," Smush whispered across the detention hall table. "Have you got the time?"

"Of course not," Mogey replied, looking up from his copy of Tractors, Tractors, and Scuttlebutt. "You know I never wear a watch."

"Well then how do you ever know what time it is?"

"What?" Mogey demanded with a level of incredulity usually reserved for an undertaker when a corpse requests a grape popsicle. "I just ask Pocketwatch Stevenson."

Mogey leaned back to reveal that the classmate in question was sitting right beside him. As Pocketwatch Stevenson shook his head with disappointment, his half dozen golden watches jangled louder then an obese janitor climbing to the top of a bell tower.

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume 549

"Never again!" Mogey said, his teeth chattering violently. "That's the last time I'll ever join in that cursed underwater snowball eating competition."

"I couldn't agree more," Smush replied as his body quaked with cold. "If I live through this, I swear I'll never eat another snowball in my life!"

The pals had collapsed on the hearth before a roaring fire. Warm bricks now rested on each of their frozen tummies.

"I know it's for a good cause," Mogey moaned. "But why do they have to have it in January?"

"The underwater part would be so much nicer in the summer," Smush added, "although I suppose snowballs would be pretty hard to come by. I'm off to boil some water - do you want something hot? Maybe a cup of coffee or some soup?"

"Have we got any maple syrup?"

"Does this look like the house of a molasses and honey magnate?" Smush said. "Of course we have maple syrup. Are you going to use it to sweeten your coffee?"

"Nope," Mogey replied. "I'm going to drink it straight up. Nothing cures a stomach ache like a cup full of syrup."

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume 548

"I can't find it anywhere!" Smush shouted. "Grandpa Ulysses would tan my hide if he found out I lost it, God rest his soul."

Mogey looked up from his copy of Slightly Less Flabby Abs in Seven Minutes and watched his pal rooting furiously through the cigar box that served as their cookbook, flinging recipes willy nilly around the kitchen.

"Easy does it, Smush," Mogey said calmly, getting up to offer his assistance. "What are you looking for?"

"Grandpa Ulysses' saltwater taffy recipe," Smush replied. With the speed of a vegetarian cobra, Mogey lashed out and slapped Smush across the face.

"I'm sorry," Mogey said immediately, snatching his hand back. "It was a gut reaction. I'm sure we can think this through: Let's start with the ingredients. Clearly Grandpa Ulysses' specialty was composed of three things: salt, water, and taffy."

"You're a genius, Mogey!" Smush exclaimed. "I think you've got it. Now how do we combine them?"

"Just stir them together in a pot over high heat," Mogey replied wisely.

The pals didn't make anything close to resembling saltwater taffy that day, but they did create a salve that proved to be a miraculous remedy for the red hand-print on Smush's face. The boiling hot salty taffy took so many layers of skin off, you'd never know Smush had been slapped at all.