Oopsy-Daisy! Talking Crazy!

     Andrew's eyes lit up. "Turdle Smurdle?"

     Sammy looked at him quizzically then said, "Um... Sure. It was in my back yard this morning. I hope it stays there so you can see it too."

     "Me too! Me too! A Blumaroo!" said Andrew.

     Sammy frowned a bit and looked at Andrew. "Not a Blumaroo, a Turdle!"

     "Turdle Smurdle in a tree. I hope it's there for me to see," said Andrew excitedly.

     Sammy studied his friend for a minute then tried again, speaking very slowly. "It's not in a tree... It's a Turdle... On the ground... In my back yard... Do... you... want... to... see... it?"

     Andrew grinned big and bobbed his head up and down. He clamped his mouth tight shut and then almost as if it was unbidden he shouted, "I want to go! I want to go! He can't be far, he moves too slow!" With that he clapped both paws over his mouth and his little Kacheek shoulders drooped dejectedly.

     Sammy looked at him in bewilderment. "What's the matter with you anyway? How come you're talking like that?"

     Andrew sighed. "I do not know, but every time - I say a word I make a rhyme. Oopsy-Daisy! Talking Crazy!"

     Sammy's jaw dropped and the Turdle was instantly forgotten. His friend had something serious going on here. "How long have you been doing this?"

     "A day or so... I do not know."

     Sammy flipped his fluffy Wocky tail to one side, plopped down on a rock, and cupped his chin with his paws. What to do? What to do? Finally he looked carefully at Andrew and asked, "When was the last time you remember speaking normally?"

     Andrew gave him a woeful look. "I slept soundly through the night. I was doing this with morning's light."

     "OK," Sammy said. "I saw you yesterday morning and you were fine. You slept well all night but you were talking crazy when you woke up this morning. That means this had to have happened yesterday afternoon. Where all did you go? What did you do?"

     Andrew thought for a minute then said, "I met with you, we played a bunch... then I went home and had some lunch."

     "And then?" urged Sammy.

     "Full tummy makes me tired you see... I took a nap up in a tree."

     "You took a nap in a tree?" asked Sammy in astonishment. "Maybe you slid out of it and knocked your brain goofy!"

     Andrew shook his head. "Sturdy limb made cozy bed. I did not fall out on my head."

     He thought a bit then added, "After nap I walked to town and drank a Chocolate Milkshake down."

     Sammy shrugged. "No problem there. I had one of those myself yesterday and I'm not talking crazy. It would be a whole lot easier to help if you could just talk regular! But then, if you were talking regular you wouldn't even need help. What if you wrote your answers instead of saying them out loud?" He darted into the house and promptly came back with a pencil and paper, practically shoving them at Andrew. "Now," he said, "What did you do after the milkshake?"

     Andrew wrote rapidly without looking up.

     When Sammy could stand it no longer he yanked the paper away and read, 'Rode Wheeler's Bike, then took a walk. At that time I could still talk! Picked some berries from the vine, played Gormball with a friend of mine. Played my Banjo for a while, I studied Math and ....' "Oh, for crying out loud!" he said in frustration. "Writing doesn't help! You're still doing it! Just go ahead and talk. It's faster."

     Andrew took a deep breath and started again. "Met Delina and did a craft, to Kiko Lake and rode a raft, the Negg Cave where I worked a puzzle, and played with a Blue Evil Fuzzle. The Poogle Races in Faerieland, and then to hear Jazzmosis Band. An Edna's Quest and Eliv Thade, and made some Homemade Marmalade. To Slushie Shop to have a snack and then I played Advert Attack."

     Sammy watched his friend in amazement. He thought to himself, "Holy Kau! And I thought I had a busy day! How did he have TIME for a nap... in a tree or anywhere else?"

     Andrew was still going. "Took a dip in Magma Pool and spent some time at Training School. Fed a Kadoatie, took pound pet home, and then I went to the Battledome."

     Sammy drew aimless lines in the dirt with a stick. Half of his mind was listening to the endless, singsong ditties coming from his friend and the other half was searching desperately for a way to help him. "Oopsy-Daisy! Talking Crazy! That's putting it mildly," he thought.

     "...found a Red Oranu Bead, went to get a book to read, Soup Faerie and the Money Tree, I played some slots with Brucey B, Moltara worms and Rubbish Dump, the Wise Old King and....."

     "Wa-a-ait! Wa-ait, wait, wait, wait, a minute!" Sammy interrupted him.

     Andrew looked at him expectantly and clamped his mouth tight shut.

     "I've already figured out there is no possible way you could have done all that stuff in one afternoon. It's all part of whatever is wrong with you and it's getting worse! Why, you barely stop to breathe now. Just babbling anything to make a rhyme. But something you said gave me an idea! You mentioned a book to read. THE LIBRARY FAERIE! She has read every book in her collection so she must be really smart! Maybe she will know something that will help us!"

     The Library Faerie was behind her desk when they entered. "Well, hello there, you two," she said smiling at them. "Andrew, back so soon?"

     Andrew just nodded.

     "So soon?" asked Sammy. "Was he here earlier?"

     "Why, yes," said the Library Faerie. "He was here just yesterday afternoon. I'm sorry I didn't get to say goodbye when you left Andrew, but I was busy with some reports. Why do you ask?"

     Sammy looked around to see if anyone might be listening, then whispered. "He... um.... sort of has a problem. We... um... we thought maybe you might know how to help."

     "A problem is it?" she asked. "Oh dear me! Well, to help a problem I must first know what it is."

     Andrew kept his paws clamped tightly over his mouth and Sammy answered for him. He explained the best way he could about his friend's strange behavior.

     "Dear me," said the Library Faerie. "He was talking fine when he came in and I didn't get to speak with him again before he left. It must be something that happened here. Do you remember which book you read, Andrew?"

     Andrew's paws flew from over his mouth and he blurted, "Nitty-gritty witty ditty, non-stop over the top! Oopsy-Daisy talking crazy! I did not sit and read a book, it was a learning scroll I took!"

     The Library Faerie suddenly looked worried. "A scroll? You read a scroll? Oh dear me, oh dear, dear me!" She grew very serious as she talked to them. "Scrolls can be excellent learning tools and you can benefit greatly from some of them. Others have been known to have some really strange side effects if not handled properly. Andrew? Do you remember which scroll you read?"

     Andrew nodded and said, "I wanted to learn to be crafty and agile. I did not know it would make me so fragile." He walked over to the shelves, scanned across them for a moment and chose a lovely white one with a pretty orange seal. He took it from the shelf and handed it to the Library Faerie.

     "Dear me," she said as she looked it over. "This is the Scroll of Trickery. It should indeed make you crafty and agile, but it is also one of the worst for being finicky about the way it is handled and read. This could very well be the source of the problem. It is well known for some of the tricks it plays when handled improperly. What you might have done wrong in the handling and the reading of it really doesn't matter much at this point. What is important is how to undo it. Let me double-check a couple of things right quick."

     She hurried to a shelf containing enormous reference books and after choosing several of them she began to search frantically through them, pausing occasionally to say, "Ah-ha!" or "mm-hmm" or "I see."

     Finally she returned, bringing one of the big books with her and placed it on the table. Then she hurried to the scroll shelves where she chose one and brought it back with her. "This," she told Andrew, "is the Scroll of Forgetfulness. According to the reference book, if we can get you to forget you read the Scroll of Trickery your unfortunate side effect should also go away. But we have to be very careful with this one too."

     "OK, OK, let's read away!" said Andrew hopefully.

     "Not so fast," the Library Faerie replied. She carefully unrolled the Scroll of Forgetfulness. "Now," she told him, "hold it by this corner and this one." She hurried to the table to check her book again while Andrew did as she had instructed. "OK now, tilt your head a little to the left... a little more... like so," and she gently tipped his head to just the proper angle. She checked her book one more time. "Now close your right eye and read the scroll out loud and be very careful to pronounce each word precisely."

     Andrew did as she said and as he finished reading the scroll the expression in his eyes seemed to change. He blinked hard a couple of times and looked around. "Hey, Sammy! What are you doing here?"

     Sammy and the Library Faerie grinned at each other and she gave him a little wink. They both knew the Scroll of Forgetfulness had worked.

     Andrew hopped up from his chair and headed for the door. "I'm starving. Want to go somewhere and get a snack?"

     Sammy hurried after his friend.

     As they walked along licking away at their Dripping Ice Cream Cones, Andrew turned to Sammy. "So," he asked, "what have you been doing all day?"

     Sammy smiled to himself. "Well, this morning I found a Turdle in my back yard. Wanna come see it?"

The End