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Stories Featured Story: Lenny and the Lentils Lenny Lentil was a little round fellow, a generally happy sort. But he had one question, one simple burning question. So he turned to his brothers in a bin in the food store. "Brothers," he said, "If chicken is a meat, and carrots are a vegetable, then what's a little lentil?" Well, the brothers they shimmied and shook, they rolled and rollicked until at last a wizened old cracked one spoke. "We're beans," he barked. "That's what we are." Lenny looked to his left, to a bin of big black beans. Then he looked to his right to a bin of big red beans. "We don’t look like beans," he said, "I'm sure that just can't be." So he thought and he thought and at last he called out to his maker. "God", he said, "I've never called on you before but I need you now. If chicken is a meat, and carrots are a vegetable, then what's a little lentil?" Well the windchimes rang and the cash register rung, but not an answer was heard. "God," called out Lenny again. But the wizened old lentil cut him short. "Pipe down,” he said, "Do you want to get us all in trouble?" Lenny shook his head. He was quiet, but he could not stop thinking. He grew on a plant, so he wasn't an animal. He didn't have seeds, so he wasn't a fruit. But just then the stockboy came along and lifted up the bin. Lenny jumped on his brothers and scrambled to the top. "Stock boy," he called out, "You fill us up every day, but pray tell me, what am I?" Shocked, the stockboy stumbled and dropped the bin. Lenny and the lentils went tumbling all across the floor. Boss Lynn ran right over. "You stupid boy," she said to the stockboy. "What are those?" the boy gasped, pointing at the lentils. "Why they're lentils - they're a pulse, whatever do you mean?", boss Lynn replied. Lenny did a jig. At last he knew. "I'm a pulse, I'm a pulse," he sang. "At last it's all come clear." "You damn fool," croaked the wizened old lentil, lying on his back. "What's a pulse?" Then Lenny's world came crashing down. "I don't know," he said. "What is a pulse?" "See," said the cracked old lentil, "You ask one question and you raise ten more." So now Lenny wanders the world, searching for his answer. Nobody seems to know, not the stockboy, boss Lynn, or other lentils. But should you find a tormented lentil in your soup, please stop and help him out. So listen up and listen close, for I'll say it one time only. A pulse is a plant from the leguminous family, with seeds in pods rich in protein.

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