The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush: 2025 Edition - Episode 8

 "Again, I feel I should mention that a joint consultation is most unusual," the guidance counselor said, peering over his spectacles at Mogey and Smush. 

"We're ok with unusual," Smush replied, hoisting a 24-ounce can of sparkling pickle juice. "Right, Moge-man?"

"Yep," said Mogey, cheersing Smush's Dilly Fizz with a Mango Xtremo Gatorade. "Unusual and full of electrolytes."

"Alright then," the guidance counselor rejoined. He observed Mogey and Smush like a talented dog groomer might stare at two rastafarian pups named Peanut and Scallywag who keep ignoring his advice that full-body dreadlocks and digging for clams do not mix. "Have either of you given any thought to your future careers?"

"That all depends," Mogey answered. "Does making sure to drink lots of electrolytes prepare you for any careers?"

"What do you like to do? What are you good at?" The guidance counselor held up a hand to stop Mogey from interrupting. "BESIDES consuming electrolytes," he added.

"We're pretty good judges of character," said Smush.

"Perhaps police detectives, then? Or negotiators?"

"Ooh!" Smush responded, sucking his teeth. "I meant we're good at judging the character of foodstuffs, not people. You know, what goes with what, what's spoiled and what's fresh, that sort of thing."

"What about becoming chefs? That's a popular career path these days."

"Ooh!" Smush repeated, sucking his teeth once more. "We're not so much about cooking the food. What've you got that involves eating food?"

"And don't forget about the electrolytes!" Mogey chimed in.

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush: 2025 Edition - Episode 7

Mogey and Smush's wagon rumbled through a crossroads that was unremarkable except for the odd preponderance of skulls laying about, an ominous swirl of mist, and the sound of a creaking hinge, though there were no rusty gates to be seen.

Suddenly there appeared between them on the buckboard a creature of pure malice, from the tips of its crimson horns to the knuckles of its goat-like hooves.

"Uncle Eugene?" Mogey exclaimed.

"No, Mogey, ya numbskull!" Smush admonished his pal. "It's the fellow we've been waiting for." With that, Smush whipped a green-tinted visor onto his head and pulled out a pad of paper and a grease pencil. 

"You've been... waiting... for me?" the demonic being inquired uncertainly.

"Why d'you think we've been driving by this crossroads where people are constantly emerging with boots full of gold, unlimited knowledge, and extremely fresh jump shots?" Smush demanded.

The horned beast's look of brash confidence faded almost completely. Its eyes darted from Smush's shrewd note-taking on its right to Mogey - who raised his eyebrows conspiratorially - on its left. But a job is a job. "How'd you like to..." gulp "make a deal?" the fiend asked. 

"I'd like that very much indeed," Smush replied, licking the tip of his pencil. "Now I have two questions off the bat: 1) What's the smallest fraction of soul you're willing to barter with? And 2) What's the exchange rate between, say, one tenth of a soul - a very pure soul like Mogey's, here, mind - and baconator sandwiches?"

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush: 2025 Edition - Episode 6

 "A query, if I may," Mogey submitted as the pals strode through a section of the woodland known as Fungus Alley. "Why are they called toadstools?"

"How d'you mean?" Smush replied.

"Well," Mogey asked, gesturing to the bed of mushrooms that surrounded them, "I've never seen a toad sit on one." 

"I knew it!" declared Smush. "I knew those sunglasses weren't to 'help you bear the blinding white light of the scripture.' You've been napping during church!"

"Nuh uh," Mogey blustered. "I-- it's-- it's the reflection of the candlelight off the vicar's bald head as well. It gives me headaches something awf... alright how could you tell?"

"Because Brother Squoot from the Order of Wart & Slime - that's the all-toad monastery, you know - has been sitting in on services all this month. And what does he sit upon? Nothing more or less than a toadstool."

"I don't believe it," Mogey insisted.

"It's true," croaked a voice nearly beneath their feet. The pals looked down to observe a spadefoot toad perched upon a red-capped toadstool.

"Brother Squoot?" they exclaimed.

"Nay," the toad replied. "Tis I, Brother Buns, but I too am a member of the Order of Wart & Slime. And I must say, I know you young pipsqueaks like to sit on all manner of contraptions these days: your bean bag chairs and your pickup truck liftgates. Your skateboards and your stacks of Texas toast. Call me old-fashioned, but a toadstool is where my rear end belongs."

Mogey and Smush simply blinked at him.

"Welp," said Brother Buns, "I'd better get back to the monastery. The next batch of hallucinogenic tea isn't going to brew itself." 

And with that, Brother Buns hopped away.

"I think," opined Mogey, "that was the clearest answer I've ever received to a question I posed in Fungus Alley."

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush: 2025 Edition - Episode 5

 Fritz Twist Grist Mill was the best flourmaker in the district, a local institution that Mogey and Smush visited frequently. Counterintuitively, however, they usually kept their modest cereal crop at home and turned it into just that - cereal (Froot Loops, or occasionally, Sugar Smacks) - so the pals rarely had any grains for Fritz Twist to grind. The product they really came to traffic in was the second specialty of Fritz Twist and millers everywhere: gossip.

"Oy oy, Fritz," said Smush as the pals strode into the grist mill, "what's the good word?" 

"Grmph," grunted the be-overalled artisan without looking up from his spinning millstone.

"Got some news for us then, Twisty my boy?" Mogey queried.

"Ech," Fritz replied, even gruffer than before.

"Surely you've heard some update about who poisoned Oink O'Dooley's prize pig?" Smush asked. "Or the Pickleburt twins: which one chose true love and which one chose to inherit their father's duck, bean, and oatmeal farm?" 

"Meh," Fritz responded, with a shrug of his shoulders. But just then, Byron Pickleburt himself entered the mill carrying an immense sack of oats, his normally immaculate hat covered in bean vines and duck feathers.

"Oh ho ho!" Mogey exclaimed, pointing at the twin and tsking his tongue. "I see we have our answer. Choosing money over love - it's no wonder they call you 'Buy-ron.' But how can you live with yourself, knowing that the lovely Miss Dahlia Chung will be on the arm of your infernal twin Pepper Pickleburt forever more?" 

"Wot?" said Byron in a daze. 

"Everytime I think you can't possibly out-tittle-tattle yourself..." Smush murmured to the grist mill's proprietor. "Fritzy, you old scandalmonger, you've done it again!"