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Penelope the piglet lived in a pristine, picture-perfect farmyard. Her favorite thing in the entire world was her small, perfectly messy puddle. It was a respectable puddle: cool, squishy, and wonderfully mud-scented. It was, unfortunately, also located directly next to the prize-winning rose bushes of Esmeralda the exceptionally tidy sheep.

Esmeralda could not abide the puddle.

"It's a stain on the landscape, Penelope!" Esmeralda bleated one morning, daintily pushing a mud splatter away from her wool with a single hoof. "It's an unnecessary accumulation of damp earth! It simply must go!"

Penelope loved her puddle too much to let it go. "But Esmeralda," she squealed, "this is where all the best thinking happens! And the best wallowing! I can't think of a single solution to a problem outside of my mud."

Esmeralda decided to take matters into her own hooves. She procured a large shovel and, when Penelope was away investigating a particularly interesting berry, she attempted to move the puddle.

She scooped up a shovel-full of mud. As she did, the wet, heavy earth immediately plopped back into the hole she had just created. She tried scooping it all into a wheelbarrow. The water simply leaked out the bottom, and the remaining mud became a much larger, slightly mobile mess.

When Penelope returned, she found Esmeralda covered head-to-toe in mud, panting, and leaning on the shovel. The puddle, however, was exactly the same size and shape as before.

"Oh dear, Esmeralda," Penelope said, trying not to giggle. "It looks like you've been doing some serious wallowing! Did you solve a complicated problem?"

Esmeralda sighed, a defeated, muddy sound. "I solved the problem that puddles, it turns out, cannot be tidied. You may keep your perfect, messy puddle, Penelope. I, however, need a full day's bath."

Penelope happily jumped into her beloved puddle. She decided she'd never felt more intelligent or more comfortable.