Toudle-Lou and Toudle-Lee sat in a tree and ate cranberries. That's the way they'd wile away a Thursday in the land of Margoline. Some are fonder of a wander through the woods, while peeling strands of string cheese. But not the Toudles, for them noodles were as stringy as they cared to be.

One day Morris, in his Taurus, drove to Margoline. He'd tied a blender to his fender for making blue Icees. And unlike monks, who love the chunks, Morris liked his smooth. He voted chunkless, like his uncles, who signed up at a State Fair booth.

So Lou and Lee sat in their tree, eating their berries cran. They talked to Roger, a salty codger, who lived in a bright yellow van. They'd been through hobbies, like sleeping in lobbies, and making underwear out of cats. They'd sat in a urinal while folding the Journal into intricate stock-market hats. But even lawn bowling and old bathtub trolling had left them feeling fizzless and flat. So up in that tree is where they will be if you come round looking for your cat.

Morris and me crashed our car in that tree one Thursday late in July. The Toudles fell down with a thunderous sound and the blender flew up in the sky. Roger the codger and a lodger named Hodger ran up to inspect the commotion. The scene was a mess as everything, I confess, was all covered in cranberry lotion.

But in spite of the gore and all the marshmallow spores that swirled round like a tornado in Texas, the Toudles, I thought, were more excited than not since they though that the car was a Lexus. They drove it away, and when Morris yelled "Hey!" we just heard the horn beep "ta-ta" as they headed toward Rio. Morris thought I was wrong, he said "They're beeping along to Da Da Da by that German band Trio."

So the Toudles survived and are well and alive though now Lou has blenders on the brain. Lee accidentally ate a bird and the last that I heard the Toudles were laughing at mules out in Spain. That's the rumor today, though the word, as they say, can get twisted round as it carries. And now Morris and me sit here in their old tree and wonder where they found the berries.

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