The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume CCLXXXIV

On a ghastly and ghoulish evening Mogey and Smush strode through the fog of a woodland path by sputtering lanternlight, which is really the only proper way to travel on a ghastly and ghoulish evening. It wouldn't do to skip merrily along through a field of buttercups with a powerful flashlight on a ghastly and ghoulish evening now, would it? Mogey and Smush didn't think so anyway.

After some amount of time or other they saw a dancing skeleton in the path up ahead and hid behind a tree to watch him boogie. As they observed, Mogey and Smush noticed something very peculiar: the skeleton had almost no moves! So limited were his skills, in fact, that "driving the bus" and "starting the lawnmower" comprised a full three quarters of his repertoire.

Being that they were far, far better dancers than the skeleton, Mogey and Smush now had no qualms about approaching him and so they continued up the path.

"How dare ye?" the skeleton's voice boomed as he noticed them. He began to dance even more vigorously. "Only the dead and may pass this way alive!"

"What?" asked Smush.

"Yeah!" Mogey added. "What?"

"Only the dead may pass this way alive!" the dancing skeleton repeated.

"Hi-Yah!" Smush shouted as he karate chopped the stop button on the skeleton's jambox. The blazin' hip hop and R&B came to a screeching halt. "Try stopping us without dance music!"

"NOOO!" the skeleton cried, falling to his knee bones in anguish. And Mogey and Smush strode past him and back into the ghastly and ghoulish evening.

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume CCLXXXIII

One wintry night Mogey and Smush were eating gummy bears before a roaring fire. Mogey, who believed the head of a gummy bear was a great delicacy, while the feet were merely an adequate hors d'oevre, set about biting off the bottom halves of his gummies first.

"Look what I've created!" Mogey shouted, showing Smush a two headed bear he'd constructed out of two gummy upper halves stuck together.

"Get away, Mogey!" Smush answered, cowering in his armchair as his eyes widened. "You're scaring me!"

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume CCLXXXII

One day as they took a cool, mossy shortcut down a cool, mossy alleyway, Mogey and Smush encountered the oddest fellow they ever did meet. The creaking of his knees as he approached gave Mogey and Smush a mighty start, for the sound had been oddly similar to the noise produced when the proprietor of the nearby bakery opened the back door to shoo them away from a sack of day-old croissants.

"Would you gentleman care to see a magic trick?" the odd fellow asked. Mogey and Smush stood up and regarded him for a moment. He wore jean shorts that went down almost to his ankles, a piratical vest but no shirt, and a tiny hat that appeared to be a deodorant cap held to his head with rubber bands. His ears too were large and oddly pointed, like a mouse's ears.

"No," Mogey answered.

"I agree," Smush added. "I have a distinct inkling that you will attempt to steal our croissant sack or tickle our feet, and neither sounds appealing."

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume CCLXXXI

One fateful night Mogey and Smush were out for revenge. The manager of a nearby Linens n' Things had refused to accept Mogey and Smush's pillowcase full of nickels as payment for a fondue pot, leaving them no choice but to make him their mortal enemy.

Now Mogey and Smush were camped outside the manager's house in the dead of night, waiting for the perfect opportunity to deploy a weapon of immeasurable cruelty. Even Mogey and Smush thought twice about using such a pernicious device, but they had a reputation to uphold. One day a manager at Linens n' Things wasn't accepting their money, the next it would be neighborhood children stealing sausages from their legendary sausage cellar.

"It's time, Mogey," Smush whispered.

"I-I don't think I can do it," Mogey answered, wincing as an owl hooted softly overhead.

"You yellow-bellied wimp," Smush said, shaking his head. "Give it to me."

Mogey handed him the weapon. Smush took aim and threw the roll of toilet paper high into the tree overhanging the manager's front porch.

"Run, Mogey!" Smush shouted as the roll plopped to the ground. "Run for the hills!"

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume CCLXXX

"It's an outrage, I say! A travesty!" Mogey yelled as he stomped angrily about the house. "What mockery of a society allows an establishment like McGinty's Chicken and Pickles to give me only two packets of ranch dressing along with my 20-piece chicken nuggets? Two! What kind of world are we living in? Two packets isn't enough in which to dip a single, solitary nugget, let alone 20! It's preposterous, I say! It's, it's...."

"I'm going to stop you right there, Mogey," Smush interjected. "Your face is literally covered in ice cream. I mean ear to ear. Did you go swimming in cookies n' cream? Or what?"

"I got some soft serve in a baseball helmet and forgot my spoon," Mogey said. "But that's really beside the point."

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume CCLXXIX

Mogey and Smush strode toward town with great excitement, for it was Tuesday, the Thirty-Fourth of October, or as it was known in their township, The Running of the Woodchucks. Mogey and Smush practically skipped with excitement, but they knew they mustn't actually skip, for skipping was forbidden during the Festival of the Running of the Woodchucks.

Once they got to town, Mogey and Smush claimed an area in the most dangerous section of the alley where the woodchucks would be running. On any normal day the spot was known as Mr. Sanders' Butter Buffet, but during the Running of the Woodchucks it was called Dead Man's Corner.

A far off bell announced that the woodchucks had been released from their holding pen atop Grapenut Hill (as if they needed a downhill start!) and then the nerves began. Every runner in the alleyway - Mogey and Smush included - felt the thrill of mortal danger at their fingertips. And then it happened.

"Here they come!" shrieked the voice of a young boy watching from a rooftop.

Some of the first woodchucks came into few, moving at a such a frightening pace that they covered a good ten feet with each minute that passed. The admittedly chubby animals were visibly winded, but their breathlessness only made them appear more fearsome as they bared their savage teeth.

"Heaven help us," Mogey muttered, as the runners in the alleyway turned and ran screaming from the pursuing animals, hoping against hope that they wouldn't be gored.

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume CCLXXVIII

Mogey and Smush loved to muse about the great issues of the day over breakfast. So monumental were their musings that, had breakfast lasted all day, the world would be rid of many of its problems, as well as a great deal of its bacon, tea, and toast.

"Mogey," Smush intoned on one such occasion of musination. "What, in your opinion, is the very best thing to dunk a doughnut into?"

"Well put, Smush," Mogey replied. "There are many delights into which I might choose to dunk a doughnut: coffee, hot cocoa, even tea. But the very best thing to dunk a doughnut into is a bowl of marshmallow fluff."

"An astute observation indeed, Mogey," Smush responded. "But more mistaken you could not be. The very best think to dunk a doughnut into is a jar full of more doughnuts! If you shape your doughnut into a makeshift fishhook you can produce what leading doughnut scientists call a 'barrel of monkeys effect.' Sometimes you can pull out five more doughnuts in a single dunk!"

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume CCLXXVII

One day an elderly gentleman strolling past Mogey and Smush's abode noticed a sign staked out front. 10 Butterflies for 10 Dollars the sign read, and so the elderly gentleman - thinking instantly of his two lovely granddaughters - turned up the path that ran around back.

"Hello, hello," Smush said, greeting the man as he came around the corner. "Come for some butterflies, have you?"

"Why yes," the gentleman replied.

"Excellent," said Smush, relieving the man of ten dollars as well as his coat, hat, and walking stick. "Now you just have a seat here," Smush gestured to a moth eaten armchair facing the back garden, "and we'll get started. Mogey! Let 'em rip!"

Mogey emerged from the barn wearing a wrestling singlet with the words World's Strongest Butterflier scrawled on the back and a holding a slender dumbbell in each hand. He then found a flat spot in the grass and proceeded to execute a set of flawless butterfly curls.

"I think there's been a misunderstanding," the elderly gentleman began to say, but was interrupted by a loud CLANK.

"Give him back $6, Smush," an exhausted looking Mogey grunted as he nursed his sore arms. "I could only do four."

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume CCLXXVI

One rainy day Mogey began acting very strangely. He couldn't seem to sit still and walked broodily about the house all morning.

"Whatever's the matter, Mogey?" Smush asked. "Got a bee in your bonnet?"

"No," Mogey replied. "There's no bee. I feel like I've forgotten a wondrous idea I once had and it's driving me batty!"

"That's what I meant," Smush said. "Bee in your bonnet is just an expression."

No sooner had the words left Smush's mouth than an enormously fat bumblebee crawled out from under Mogey's bonnet and proceeded to floodle (the flying equivalent of waddling) across the room and out the window.

"Nope, you were right, Smush," Mogey said. "There was no idea, it was just a bee in my bonnet."

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume CCLXXV

Every so often, Rooster P. Shuttlecock, the chicken who'd taught Mogey and Smush everything they know, would stop in for a little visit. One such occasion occurred on a snowy Tuesday in late February, when Rooster P. Shuttlecock came bobbing up the path. Mogey and Smush burst through the door and came to meet him in the front garden.

"Rooster!" Mogey shouted gleefully. "You're finally back!"

"Buh-caw!" said Rooster P. Shuttlecock.

"You must be freezing," Smush added, brushing the snow from their mentor's feathers. "Why don't you come inside for a nice hot bowl of chicken noodle s--" he began, but stopped when Mogey caught his eye and glared at him. "Or we could fix you a plate of chicken pot p--" Smush tried to say, but halted once again as Mogey shook his vigorously."

"Buck-buck-buck," Rooster P. Shuttlecock replied.

"I know just the thing," Mogey assured him. "It's scarcely past breakfast time and I make the best Eggs Benedict you've ever tasted!"

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume CCLXXIV

One day Smush sauntered into the kitchen to find Mogey hard at work attempting to eat what appeared to be an extremely crunchy sandwich.

"What've you got there?" Smush asked his pal.

"Well," Mogey replied, wiping his eyes, "I thought to myself this morning, I thought, cookie crunch is so tasty in ice cream cake - why shouldn't it be good in other foods? So what I have here is a maple-glazed turkey and cookie crunch sandwich on crusty Italian."

"You know something, Mogey?" Smush said with a sigh. "Sometimes you make me so mad I want to slap a lion right in the face."

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume CCLXXIII

Over the years, Mogey and Smush's Fanning Palace saw less and less business. At first they'd been wildly successful: folks from all over town had come during the hot summer months to be fanned by all manner of palm fronds, folding fans, and other such devices.

Mogey and Smush had hired a veritable army of apprentice fanners and they'd expanded the business into an enormous warehouse to have enough for their clientele. Now, however, they'd been forced to lay off all their employees except for an overeager young chap named Magoo, and they'd moved back into a little shop on High Street.

Mogey and Smush just couldn't understand where all their customers had gone. It was hot, after all, and hot days had always been their busiest times.

"Sheesh," Mogey said, wiping his brow and glancing around their empty Fanning Palace. "It is hotter than a hot plum pudding in here."

"One hundred and ten degrees, they're saying," Smush replied.

"I can't stand it anymore!" Mogey shouted finally, leaping to his feet. "Can you and Magoo watch the shop for a bit, Smush? I'm going across the street to the bank. They have air conditioning in there that'll knock your socks off."

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume CCLXXII

One warm spring day Mogey and Smush were walking off an exceptionally hearty and well balanced meal that represented each of the food groups. Crispy fried onion rings represented the vegetable and whole grains categories and chili cheese fries balanced the meal out with dairy and protein.

So Mogey and Smush felt healthy and chipper as they walked beside the River Bulch. After some time, they happened upon a panhandler holding out a battered top hat.

"How'd you gents like to get in on the ground floor of the biggest business in Murtlby this decade?" the panhandler asked. Mogey and Smush stopped dead in their tracks.

"We're listening..." Smush said.

"The name's Pine," the panhandler replied, extending a mitten-ensconced hand (though it was quite warm out). "Q. Pine."

"Well Mr. Pine," Mogey rejoined, "what's your business idea?"

"Straight down to business, eh? I likes it. So everyone likes pigs, see?" Q. Pine began. "But what's the biggest danger of owning 'em? Wolves a' course. A piggie's just a soft little wolf treat oinking in his pen. What they need is a little something to protect 'em. So once I gets me a little money I'm gonna breed pigs with hedgehogs. What wolf would carry off a pig covered in spikes?"

"Poor Q. Pine," Mogey said gently, knowing he was about to dash the panhandler's dreams. "I'm sorry to tell you this, but that's already been invented."

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume CCLXXI

"Smush! Smush!" Mogey screamed, bursting into Smush's room at the exceptionally early hour of quarter past eleven. "I've been stricken with some horrible affliction!"

"Wha?" Smush mumbled, opening his eyes groggily.

"Say it isn't so, Smush!" Mogey shrieked. "Tell me I haven't got the moose pox!"

"Calm down, Mogey," Smush replied sitting up in bed. "You're fine."

"But my looks are all I've got!"

"It's just ink, I tell you!" Smush shouted, wiping a damp cloth over his pal's face. It came up streaked with blue. "Don't you remember what we were playing last night after supper? This is why I always tell you to wash your face after a game of Freckleface!"

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume CCLXX

Thursday night was always Thumb Rasslin' Night at Mogey and Smush's house. Everyone who lived within ten miles of Tater Manor (as their humble abode was called) would venture out into the night air for an evening of war declarations and sneak attacks.

Unfortunately, Mogey and Smush lived in the deep dark woods of Fooglebern and so the only people who lived within ten miles of Tater Manor were themselves and a homely woodchuck named Leopold. Leopold didn't have the necessary equipment for thumb rasslin (namely, a thumb) but he was an enormous fan of the sport.

One such Thumb Rasslin' Night, Mogey and Smush were locked in a heated battle. Mogey's thumb seemed to have the upper hand, and it stalked Smush's thumb around the ring with all the cunning of a thumb hunting its prey.

"Just a second, Mogey," Smush said finally. "I don't believe we've clarified the full extent of the rules in this match."

"No, Smush!" Mogey shouted, already sure where this was heading.

"I think someone else may have a little something to say about this thumb war," Smush went on.

"Don't...."

"That's right, it's time for ol' Lefty to tag in!" Smush announced. With that he lifted his left thumb high into the air and dropped it with full force, pinning Mogey's battlethumb to the mat. "One, two, three!" Smush yelled.

"BOOM SHAKALAKA!" shrieked Leopold, jumping to his feet.

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume CCLXIX

One evening Smush walked into the parlor to find Mogey hard at work writing something by the light of a few sputtering candles.

"What're you doing, Mogers?" Smush asked.

"Writing my pen pal," Mogey replied.

"Your pen pal?" Smush demanded. "Where did you meet a pen pal? You've never been more than a hop, skip, and jump outside of Smorgasburg."

"What's that got to do with anything?" Mogey said, putting the finishing touches on his letter. "Look, I'll show you. Every week I write a letter..." he sealed his letter inside an envelope... "and bring it over..." he walked to the the seldom used wardrobe in the corner of the parlor... "to my pen pal."

With that, he threw open the door of the wardrobe to reveal a sort of scarecrow he'd fashioned out of pens. The pen-man had on a pair of spectacles and was holding a sheet of paper in front of his head.

"Mogey--" Smush chided.

"Shh," Mogey whispered sharply. "My pen pal is still reading my last letter."

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume CCLXVIII

"Smush, I've been thinking," Mogey began one morning as they strode down the many steps that led up to their palatial cabin. "Wouldn't it be easier if we tore out these stairs and put in a nice long slide? That way we could just coast down to get the mail instead of clomp-clomping down this accursed staircase."

"Well-"

"I know what you're going to say, Smush," Mogey interrupted. "How would we get back up? How about this: we put a second slide above the cabin and hike up that hill 'round back. That way we could slide down to get back to the house as well!"

"But-"

"You're right, Smush," Mogey agreed. "That don't make much sense. We might slide right through the house and on down to the mailbox again by accident. What we need is a way to make the inside of the house less slippery. I'm thinking if we get a whole army of hedgehogs...."

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume CCLXVII

One day that may have been a Saturday, but may also have been some other sort of day you've never heard of, Mogey happened upon Smush, who was hanging a picture in the front hall.

"How're you hanging that?" Mogey asked.

"Just using a couple of tacks and some picture wire," Smush answered. Mogey grunted in reply. "Why?" Smush went on. "How would you hang a picture like this?"

"Smush, you know my policy on wall hangings," Mogey said. "If it ain't the stuffed head of a wild boar, Mogey ain't hanging it."

"I know," Smush said with a sigh. "But I wish you'd let me redecorate for you. Lil' Oinksey gets scared half to death every time he wanders into your room on accident."

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume CCLXVI

One day Mogey decided he'd had enough of his current hairstyle and set about finding a new one. He tried all manners of wearing his hair over the next few months, from long cornrows to bald and shiny, but he just couldn't seem to find the one that suited him.

Finally, Smush blustered through the door one blustery afternoon, patently out of breath and holding a crumpled advertisement.

"I've got it Mogey!" Smush cried, handing Mogey the paper in his hand. "I've found your new hair!"

"A mool-it?" Mogey asked.

"It's pronounced mullet," Smush replied. "And it's perfect for you. You know I'm not the best reader, but I picked up the words 'business' and 'party' in that ad, so I know it'll be right up your alley."

"I not sure," Mogey said. "It's pretty fancy. If I get that hairdo AND keep my rat tail, people are going to think I've gotten delusions of grandeur or something."

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume CCLXV

Mogey and Smush had a room above their chicken coup that they rented out from time to time when weary travelers happened by in search of lodging. One such traveler stumbled off the muddy track and up Mogey and Smush's front walk on a misty, drizzly day in mid-Autumn.

Mogey and Smush gave him a cup of hot ovaltine and took him out back to show him the spare room. The man was instantly impressed.

"This room pleases me greatly," he said, pulling off his worn straw hat. "I'll take it. Tucker's the name, Bertram Tucker."

"Well sir, are you plum TUCKERED out?" Mogey asked, collapsing into peals of hysterical laughter at his joke.

"Yes I am," Bertram Tucker replied mirthlessly. "And it ain't no laughing matter. My Great Uncle Ike once got so plum tuckered out that he turned purple and a pit grew right in middle of his chest. And that wasn't the end of it - he wouldn't stop working, even for a drink of water. He got all dry and wrinkly and started smelling funny...wouldn't you know it, he was prune tuckered out."

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume CCLXIV

Mogey and Smush were merry old souls
and merry old souls they were.
Mogey was the sort to make a kitten bark
but Smush could make a mad dog purr.

One day as they worked in the cucumber fields
where their bales of hay were stacked,
a gang of jaguars heard Mogey's voice
and instantly attacked.

Mogey and Smush ran straight for home
and the pals fell inside in a heap.
Smush called for Jack and he called for Ol' Blue
but the dogs fell fast asleep.

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume CCLXIII

One day Smush walked into the study to find Mogey rubbing a very curious substance on his lips. He was dipping the rather pungent stuff out of a big clay urn and applying it liberally.

"Is that a new lip balm, Mogey?" Smush asked. "It stinks to high heaven!"

"Not quite," Mogey replied. "In fact, it's lip embalm."

"Lip embalm?" Smush demanded, recoiling in horror. "But you'll render them useless!"

"Of course I will - I'm mummifying these bad boys," Mogey answered, puckering noisily. "The lips of Mogey will not be bound by the laws of mortality!"

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume CCLXII

One day Mogey and Smush decided to paper the walls of the humble house they shared. They'd finally had enough of the their current wall covering, which consisted of hair stolen from the local barbershop's floor. Smush went out for a bit and came back with three long roles of beautiful paper that was patterned with pictures of cattails swaying in a breeze.

For several long hours they worked, first with barber's shears, then with paste and paper, until their entire house was covered with the lovely cattail print. When they had finished, Mogey and Smush stood in the foyer, admiring their work.

"Those cattails really are fantastic, Smush," Mogey said. "They remind me of an absolutely super summer day spent swimming and chasing tadpoles in Bigman Pond. What do they make you think of?"

"Hot dogs on a stick," Smush muttered wistfully.

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume CCLXI

One evening Smush descended from his room looking particularly dapper. He was off to begin courting Miss Bertha Bixby (the most beautiful woman in the county over the age of 60), and so he was, as the old timers say, dressed real smoove.

"That's quite a getup you've gotten up there, Smush," Mogey said, wiping a bit of deviled ham from his cheek. "What's it all made of?"

"Well," Smush replied proudly, "my cravat is of the finest Persian silk. My waistcoat was hand-tailored by Italian craftsman, and my shoes are made of the softest calfskin in all the land."

"And the vest?" Mogey asked in awe. "What about the vest?"

"And the vest is the best piece of all," Smush continued. "I sewed it from the fur of the possum that was rooting around our trash cans last Monday."

The Abbreviated Adventures of Mogey & Smush Volume CCLX

One afternoon Mogey and Smush sat down to their typical post-luncheon snack: a steaming pan of strudel accompanied by several heaping scoops of rocky road double fudge brickle ice cream.

"Smush, I've been thinking," Mogey said as he dug a spoon into the rocky road double fudge brickle. "Maybe it's time we start eating a bit healthier. You know what they say: an apple a day keeps the doctor away."

"Aye," Smush replied. "But I also know what we say: an apple strudel a day keeps the baker away. And seeing as our baker is a bloodthirsty Hessian mercenary, I think it's probably better for our health to stay on the old strudel diet, wouldn't you think?"