THIS WEEK'S STORY

Duke the Mouse In:
MICE ON ICE

        You know how it is this time of year. We get a little snow, we get a little ice and pretty soon the sidewalks are a real mess. Well, I figured it was time for Duke to help out for a change. In case you're new to this planet, Duke is my pet mouse.
    To call him lazy is about the same as calling Mozart a piano player. I mean Duke is the Mozart of Lazy. He makes a log look active. Well, you get the idea. And I figured it was time to get some work out of that rodent.
    So I told Duke I would do the heavy shoveling of the snow if he would get started chipping at the ice. It was a big job to clean the sidewalks but even a little bit of ice work would make a difference and, besides, it would get Duke the Mouse off his duff for a change.
    As you can imagine, Duke decided to turn down the offer as he was previously committed to a nap from sunrise to sunset with just enough time off for lunch and snack time.
    Wrong. I told that whiskered fuzz ball to get on his winter jacket and high-tail it out to the sidewalk where we would both make foot travel safe for humanity again. Strange how Duke's sense of humor drains away so easily.
    I started shoveling the snow on the back side of the house while Duke was still getting prepared. My goodness he goes through a lot of primping and priming to get outside.
    Pretty soon Duke comes along and wonders if he could make a little money from all this.
    Not hardly, I tell him, because I'm not paying that little mouse-thief one red cent to do the kind of work he should be doing anyway.
    Well, Duke stands there and just rolls his eyes like I was a complete dewdrop or something. No, he tells me, money from people passing by. In exchange for something.
    Right. What kind of exchange? The kind of exchange that keeps him from slinging a pawful of ice at a stranger?
    Well, after that, Duke disappears and I finally think I've got him to do an honest day's work. After living with that mouse for so long, I should know better. I really should know much better than that.
    A few minutes later I went around to the front and my pet mouse has opened a lemonade stand and is using ice from the sidewalk to cool his lemonade. On a winter day! And to make matters worse, there's a line of people standing there waiting to get some of his lemonade. Yuck! Double yuck. That is about the most disgusting thing I can imagine on such a cold day. Not only is Duke getting out of his work, he's making money from it, too.
    Well, I quickly put a stop to all that nonsense before the health department arrived on the scene and arrested both of us. Sometimes I think we're all a little safer if Duke stays asleep for the entire day. Because next I see that Duke has started his own ice staking show and is charging admission. He is calling it "Mice On Ice". I was only gone for about thirty seconds and all the sudden, Duke is in show business. On the front sidewalk. With an ice scraper.
    I put a stop to that, too, only now I just saw Duke go by rolling a hockey puck.
    And that's the way it is with Duke.