Rubble Club Archives

Welcome, pet rock fanciers and your little rocky friends. Come on in out of the cold. It won’t be long before mine is one of the only doors open around these parts, because the season of the White Mist has been threatening to descend for a few days now. A few little whisps of mist are drifting around you as you stand in the queue outside, did you notice? That’s the Sign! We Growbies are rushing here and there delivering our presents to each other in readiness for the onset of the long winter sleep, heralded by the descent of the White Mist. No one dares to have more than they need in their larders during the season of the White Mist for fear of someone elsewhere having less than they need, (whose death from winter starvation would bring great bad luck upon the magical land of Undergrowby in the coming year). As a consequence I have a many interesting new titbits on my table than you have ever seen, nut cakes, nettle pies, gnomeberry dumplings, tangleroot crunch, dandelion fizz, mint boulders, ice water, etc., but don’t worry, Rubblers, they are just gifts to me. I’ll have them tidied away in a trice to make way for my own choice of buffet which you know and love, rock cakes and gravel tea.
What is that tinkling noise? I think there is a fairy lost in our midst. Moptop Copperleaf, this is not the home of Wanderella Windmeddler. This is the Stone Quarry, headquarters of the Rubble Club and I am its chairman, the world-famous Madge Dumpling. You can be in the Rubble Club if you like, but you must first own a pet rock.
Wanderella Windmeddler, whom you seek, is the chief wand-maker of the Magic Wand Factory and she lives to the south east of here in the gnomestead known as the Wandmakers’ Forest. Hurry off with you, if you are delivering your presents because she is always one of the first to jump into her winter cocoon and one of the last ones out of it. Nothing disturbs her once she has squeezed herself down into her cocoon. Between you and me, what with her shrieking voice and sound sleeping habits, I think she must be a bit deaf, well, either deaf or completely selfish.
She is most unlike my dutiful self, I who always put others’ needs before my own. I will be here hosting the Rubble Club, braving the winter to keep you and my little rockies happy. I might climb into my cocoon and have a little snooze now and again, or read last year’s Undergrowby Gnews till it is threadbare, but rest assured, Rubble Clubbers, on Fridays I will be wide awake and busy as a bee, grinding up the rock cakes for your buffet.
Only my neighbour, Clockit Quick, the Time and Tide Inspector, outwakes me. His job is to keep a ledger of all the comings and goings in Undergrowby, which he oversees from his tall seafront watchtower in the north. He is a cold shoulder, and poor company at the best of times, but in winter his spirits turn to ice and will not even wave at me through his window when I go out looking for specimens lost in the snow. I would dearly love to get up there in that watchtower of his and snoop out upon everyone for just a few moments but he never lets me in, no matter how many baskets of rock cakes I try to deliver to him. He just ignores me, pretends he is too busy and slams the door. No wonder he has no friends. I have to be content to read his lengthy annual report in the Undergrowby Gnews and imagine myself there witnessing it all for myself.
This week Granny Gray, my shopkeeper at the Magic Wand Factory at the far north end of Dickson Road, Blackpool, has had several delightfully noteworthy visits from some officials of the Rubble Club. My young prefects, John and Jacob and their wise, understanding mother Julie from Farnworth, Bolton, have set up a pretty little aquarium to entertain their little rocky pals and they arrived at the shop with their fish carrier in a little basket(which no doubt doubles as a pet rock carrier at other times) to collect a shoal of baby minnows from Granny Gray.
They also took a pet rock roundabout and various other bits and bobs top further enhance their already fabulously extravagant pet rock living quarters.
Julie, who is one of Granny Gray’s favourite Rubble Clubbers, happens to be a talented and prolific artist and she honoured me(via Granny Gray) with one of her beautiful paintings (I suspect it was a White Mist gift, the only one I have ever received from a human). I have placed a photograph of it in pride of place at the top of the page and I shall be framing the original and having it displayed in the shop. It’s a pet rock family portrait. There you are, Moptop Copperleaf, that’s what pampered pet rocks look like. For her inspirational work in the service of the Rubble Club, Julie has consequently been awarded a Madge Dumpling Special Award badge.
The aforementioned prefects, John and Jacob, came in to the shop wearing their pet rock bouncing nets attached to their clothing, and as promised, they won the star prize for the competition, which was an underwater magic wand stall complete with Undergrowby’s champion underwater nose-holding wizard stall-holder( to go in their fish tank). Jacob and John, if you please, just let the wizard out of the fish tank once a year so he can take a breath of fresh air, unless you decide to have the stall out on dry land. He will continue to show off his breath-holding technique for ever, no matter where he is placed. Well, Rubblers, if we could hold our breath for a year, we’d be showing off too, wouldn’t we? A round of applause for the winners, John and Jacob!
I am pleased to see that many of you have apparently decided to present each other with orphan pet rocks for your White Mist gift exchange this year, because there has been an unprecedented upturn in the adoption rate. I was not aware that humans celebrated the White Mist, but I can’t think what other reason there could be for the sudden rush. Anyway, good that the little darlings find nice welcoming new homes for the winter. The Rubble Club membership will be swollen with warm-hearted, entertaining newcomers to keep us company during the lonely winter months. Next week I will bake extra rock cakes to cater for you all. They’re world-famously unmissable, as you will discover.
Tonight, it seems, is the sweet-eating Halloween Party night in the human world, and the Magic Wand Factory shop has been full of humans dressed up as monsters and bedraggled beggars, begging for sweets from a very frightened Granny Gray, who has no sweets to give them. I have sent her off on an expedition to the sweet shop, (leaving Grandad Gray alone to face the mob), to get herself better equipped because the Halloweeners have threatened trouble if they do not get any. Dressed the way they are, I suspect they might be capable of bringing on a rainstorm, which is the only kind of trouble pet rocks care about, so Grandad Gray, the first line of defence, will have to ward them off the best he can until Granny arrives home with the sweets.
I had better go and shout at her to speed her up, so I will leave you now, Rubblers, to mingle with each other and if you have something to say to me, please leave a message and I will reply in person. I remain eternally your faithful chairman and anxious little friend, Madge Dumpling.

Come on in, Rubble Clubbers, welcome once again to my parlour here in the Stone Quarry of Undergrowby. I am the famous Madge Dumpling, your chairman and pet rock expert and over there is the fabulous Friday buffet of rock cakes and gravel tea, freshly prepared especially for you. My parlour is sparklingly clean, thanks to my husband, Malcolm, and the pet rocks are scrubbed shiny and nicely arranged in teams of five with the biggest in the middle. Five is the correct magical grouping number for pet rocks, but only during the changing of the seasons. In the next season (the season of the white mist, or late autumn), they will be in sevens and when winter arrives, the magic grouping number is One, a solitary number hated by pet rocks almost as much as they hate the rain. They would not thrive alone, so in winter I group them in one great big group, as close together as possible, so they are sort of One, but all together. I haven’t got the heart to separate them. Even the naughty pet rocks I group closely together as One,…one big naughty gang,(except for the one in the bottom of the fish tank, waiting for Tom Moffat) so they can scowl wickedly at each other all through the winter.
Next item, Announcements.
I am pleased to announce that my wonderful head prefect, Linedancer, is on the mend, but as a result of her illness, has started to talk in a strange tongue. Doc Leaf is confused and intrigued, because he has never come across this as a side effect of a torn ankle ligament ever before. She has been on a coach trip to foreign parts, looking for a venue for the next Rubble Club outing, and so he fears perhaps she has picked up a rare foreign brain disease. It’s sad, but we’ll stand by her, won’t we, Rubblers? In the words of the aforementioned Doc Leaf, “Gnature cures while-u-wait”, so, according to that it will be just a matter of time before she recovers completely. Personally I like to speed up the healing process with a little self-help. In this case I recommend my own tried and tested favourite remedies…a nice crispy rock cake and a cup of my fabulous speciality tea. My world-famous recipes are not only delicious, they are also cure-alls. Feeble, limping patients have thrown away their crutches and run off back to work at the mere sight of them. Doc Leaf denies it, (he’s jealous) but I suspect they might have a spooky little healing aura, visible only to the sick, which is of course why he is determined to be blind to it.
Now, this week I have been experimenting with something. While visiting the local back yards and popping in through the handy gnome flaps provided by the Blackpool Rubble Club members, I often see some interesting sights which give me new ideas. A few days ago, for instance, I witnessed a baby being strapped into a harness and hung from a door-frame by a giant elastic band while its mother got on with the housework. I was just about to shout out a few stern words to that cruel mother and banish her from the Rubble Club for ever when a strange thing happened. The baby did not cry out in objection as I expected, but just bounced up and down, up and down and chuckled away merrily, as if it were enjoying itself.
You can guess what I was thinking, can’t you, Rubble Clubbers? If only pet rocks had little feet to push themselves up in the air with, they could have such fun in a miniature version of the baby-bouncing rubber band. Undaunted, I have come up with an enabling solution.
I went rooting through the bins at the cafe up the road, where I gather many of my key ingredients for my recipes, and found some orange netting bags wrapped around some mouldy oranges. I discarded the oranges and shredded the netting bags into scraps just big enough to envelop a pet rock with an inch to spare on all sides. I took my most obedient pet rock and Rubble Club fashion model, Little Pearly Pebble, and wrapped her in the orange mesh. She looked very cute in orange(but she looks cute in anything, which is why she is my fashion model) and peeped seductively at the other pet rocks through the holes in the netting. I gathered the netting together above her head and tied it with one of Granny Gray’s rubber bands. I looped another rubber band through the first rubber band to act as a hanging thread to complete my pet rock bouncer. I dangled the bouncer in the air and Pearly Pebble started to bounce around just like the aforementioned baby in the house. She loved it and one by one, the other rockies took their turns and they all agreed it was a sensational device.
The only problem is, pet rocks have no feet and so they will always have to depend on us to supply the bouncing movement. but never fear, Rubble Clubbers, I have a solution up my sleeve. It comes in the form of a safety pin (or your prefect’s badge, you prefects), pinned into your clothing so wherever you go you can be hands-free and still activate your pet rock bouncers, and your pet rocks, while bouncing, will be able to see everything that is going on around you and remember facts and figures for their vast, ever-hungry memory banks( remembering things is their favourite hobby, as you should already know). I myself have, dutifully as ever, taken up the yoke of service to pet rocks and as I speak, I am decked out in hundreds of gaudy little orange bags pinned to my yellow outfit. I am now on the look-out for netting bags in different colours to blend more quietly with my wardrobe, and have set the gossip-mongering local pigeons(who always seem to have too much time on their hands anyway) the task of overhead surveillance, seek and rescue for this important mission. I had to pretend it was a game, a sort of treasure hunt. The prize for the winner(the fetcher of scraps of netting in every colour of the rainbow) will be the crumbs from my buffet table. I should have plenty of material in no time at all. Trust me. Those pigeons love my delicious grit-enriched crumbs.
Let this be an inspiration to you, Rubble Clubbers. I will no doubt be seeing hundreds of you walking along Blackpool Promenade on your way to the Magic Wand Factory Shop on Dickson Road, wearing your pet rock bouncers like a badge of honour. The first one to appear in the shop wearing (at least) one will be given a special prize. Until then, or until next Friday, whichever comes first, I remain your faithful friend and ever hopeful chairman, Madge Dumpling.

Better late than never, here I am, out of breath and glad of a rest, Rubble Clubbers, your faithful little friend and chairman, Madge Dumpling . I have been up to my neck in endless washing since the crack of dawn, getting the little pet rockies’ winter blankets scrubbed and dried in the autumn breeze before it turns too cold to do the laundry. I am only half-way through, but the Rubble Club meeting now takes priority.
When do I do my own washing, I hear you wonder, with all these pet rock blankets to get through? It’s simple, I have put my husband, Malcolm Dumpling, in charge of cleaning and re-stuffing our own fresh winter cocoons and cleaning out the bed cupboards ready for the long winter sleep, in between doing all the other house-work. Well, I have enough to do, don’t I? Being a world-famous expert pet rock whisperer and chairman of the Rubble Club is a full time job.
Come on in, Rubble Clubbers, you have queued up outside long enough now. I am pleased to see you have your pet rocks suitably attired for the cooler weather, wrapped up in cotton wool balls and blankets, stuffed into babies’ socks, surrounded by hot water bottles, etc.. Very well done, Rubblers!
My trusty prefect, Linedancer, is still off sick(dutifully waiting for gnature to cure her) so I am single handed here at the Rubble Club, but I am taking it in my stride like the unstoppable little rock that I am. You know me by now, Rubblers, and you have never heard me complain, have you? There is never a moment’s lapse in my self-denial. Even now, as my hands are red raw with all the washing, the beach is full of uncollected rock samples, my prefect is off sick, uncomplainingly I still manage to find the time to make the rock cakes for the Rubble Club’s morning buffet, even though it is already afternoon and my weary arms and legs are aching. Move over, Rubblers and let me get to the rock cakes and gravel tea. I need to be revivied. That’s better! Now I feel more like a vigorous little gossiping session with you all before I carry on with the washing.
Granny Gray, my shopkeeper at the Magic Wand Factory on Dickson Road, Blackpool, has had a busy week finding homes for all those magic wands and other ‘magical’ bits and bobs she has littering the place, getting in the way of my pet rock display. No wonder the pet rocks have not been moving fast of late, no one can see them for all that other stuff. Yesterday I was hiding under the shop counter listening to her selling something to someone and she never said “And how many pet rocks would you like with that?” like I trained her to do. I gave her a good ticking off, I can tell you, and when the next customers came in I listened to her again to check she was behaving herself. It was a delightful family from America, from Nashville, Tennessee, with two well-behaved children who never even looked at the pet rocks. They were too busy choosing their magic wands to notice the pet rocks calling out to them from the back of the shop. Just as they were leaving, Granny Gray handed them both an orphan pet rock and talked them through the adoption procedure. She made it sound like agony, and it just goes to show how kind and lovely the people of Nashville, Tenessee are, because, despite Granny Gray’s feeble salesmanship, they instantly agreed to join the Rubble Club and take the orphans home with them.
Linedancer, I understand from the conversation I overheard from under the counter that Nashville Tenessee is the home of country linedancing music and has many thousands of coach trips of linedancers in their cowboy hats, such as yourself visiting its ballrooms to have a little dance. Perhaps we should organise the Seagull Coaches of Blackpool to take us there for our next Rubble Club outing. That is, of course, when you are well again, Linedancer. Please write to me, Rowan and Emma from Tennessee and give me the directions to your house, so I can tell the coach driver.
I and the all the pet rocks in the party can stay at your house. There will be plenty of room for me, I am only six inches tall and I will bring my own blanket. I and the rockies can sleep in the cat’s basket along with your pet rocks who will love to have a sleepover with their old friends. Pet rocks (and myself)love to snuggle up to a nice furry cat. For the sake of security, I and the cat may need to have a snoop around your house in the night and check your cupboards for intruders. I might help myself to a little snack as I go, but rest assured I will not feed the cat any sweets.
Overnight, if your kitchen is equipped, I will make you some nice gritty breakfast rock cakes for all the pet rocks in the party in return.( I like to pay my way with my best efforts.) The other Rubble Clubbers can sleep in the coach outside and they will bring their own sandwiches. We are no trouble, are we, Rubblers?
If this trip to Nashville, Tennessee does not happen, Rubble Clubbers, do not despair. We can all rack our brains to think of an alternative.
The baby fish in the fish tank are growing bigger and bigger and it is now time for a few more of you to get a fish tank filled up ready to adopt a few of them. Winter(which is on its way) is the season of the water element, and what better water element accessory can you have than a fish tank, Rubblers? It will help to hypnotise your pet rocks to sleep the winter away and give you some peace and quiet while you wait patiently for spring to arrive. Water is the wellspring of life, and correctly placed in your home, (in the north or at the back of the room or house) will help to create great abundance. In our case, the abundance came in the form of hundreds of tiny fishes growing bigger every day, but you can hope and wish for a more useful form of abundance yourself.
Please excuse me now, Rubble Clubbers, while I leave you and go back to my washing. Talk among yourselves. I will be listening in not far away. Till next week, I remain your blanket-scrubbing little friend and devoted chairman, Madge Dumpling.

Hello and welcome to you all on this bright autumn day. This is Madge Dumpling again in the service of pet rocks and their gentle owners worldwide, re-opening the doors of the Stone Quarry to you all. The rock cakes have lost their crispness, I’m afraid, because I made them during the cold snap a couple of days ago and they caught a touch of the damp overnight when it rained in. Still, I know some of you like them soggy, so dig in!
First, the mailbag. Linedancer, I am distraught that you have injured yourself and I have consulted Doc Leaf who has signed you off sick until further notice. Well, according to him, ligaments and tendons are governed by the wood element, and if injured need rest, support and gentle twirling movements of every other joint in the body except for the damaged area, to keep the wood element supple. Pay particular attention to the head, neck, shoulders and eyes. Invent a little wobbly dance with your eyes, and let all your upper body join in until you start to smile. That’s it, you need to keep yourself cheery. If ligaments, tendons, joints or nails are damaged you may find yourself prone to bad moods, anger, frustration and depression, but rest assured it will pass along with the illness. But I know you, Linedancer, you love your work (like myself) and it must be killing you to be off sick, but off sick you will have to stay. I can’t be having my head prefect going around limping and shouting at everyone. No, stay under the covers until you are quite well, Linedancer. You know what it says on the sign hanging outside Doc Leaf’s Surgery…. …”Gnature Cures While u Wait”. You will have to master the ancient art of waiting, and knit some little scarves for your pet rocks while you are at it.
All this wood element illness could be because you were born in the forest, but I suspect, by my acute powers of detection that you might have been rambling around in the Wandmakers’ Forest once too often, visiting that Wanderella Windmeddler, and tripped up on a twig. Well, if you have, it is all coming home to roost now, and I hope it makes you realise how much safer it is up in the Rocky Headlands here with me.
Now, Tom Moffat, you are turning out to be a little star, isn’t he, Linedancer? You will be having more than one fish to take back home with you as a prize for all your lovely letters Tom. You will need a little shoal of at least five, because some creatures, like pet rocks, mountain minnows and ourselves, hate to be alone. And yes, it sounds as if that grumpy, naughty pet rock is going to love it at your house when you finally fish him out of the bottom of the tank. I shan’t tell him though, or he’ll think he’s won. If you want to spoil him, all I can say is, you will have to live with him, so it’s up to you. By the way, there was another letter about fish and the naughty pet rock. Was that from you too, Tom, or is there someone else called Anonymous writing to me? I would be relieved to solve this mysterious riddle, so would you be so kind as to let me know, Tom, then I can bring my investigation on this matter to a close.
Earlier, I mentioned that there has been a cold snap when the rain came in and drenched the little rockies hatching along my hearth, who, as I predicted when I heard the first drip, drip, drip, have all turned out to be naughty pet rocks, with faces only a mother(such as me, and you, Rubble Clubbers) could love. I already had a group of naughty rockies sulking away unwanted in the naughty corner of the pet rock display in the Magic Wand Factory Shop on Dickson Road, Blackpool. I was starting to worry about having too many grumpy faces around the place, but this week a strange miracle has taken place. A kind, jolly holiday-maker came in the shop and made a bee-line for the naughty corner. He whisked up a whole crowd of naughty pet rocks as presents for his friends and family back home. I hope his friends and family are very understanding and if any of them are here at the meeting, a hearty welcome to you, and by way of consolation for those new grumpy little faces in your midst, I can recommend them for their service to deterring unwanted guests, burglars and the like. Deterrence is their best talent, so give them a job in this sector and it will keep them distracted from other attention-seeking behaviours to which they are prone. And keep a lid on fish tanks at all times or they will be in there sulking away and depressing your fish.
Anyway, thanks to that, there is an empty spot in the naughty corner, just in time for the new arrivals. Pet rocks move in mysterious ways, don’t they, Rubblers? I wonder who will be taking this new batch off our hands? It could be you.
The sky is now darkening outside, the wind is howling and the flags outside the fancy dress shop across the road are fluttering wildly. Rubble Clubbers, on days like this please turn your pet rocks’ faces away from the window, like mine are, and sing them a little song to drown out the sound of the wind. It’s looking like there will be no trips around the Blackpol Illuminations for tonight’s party of little rockies, who are already perched inside my Illuminations Tour Basket with their umbrellas, waiting for the off. Oh, they have heard me saying that and are looking dazed and miserable. Well, all right then, but it will have to be very quick! And no umbrellas! And you will all have to have a hot bath when we get back.(More work for Granny Gray, the shop-keeping martyr whom I have trained well in the ancient practise of pet rock grooming. I expect I will be too exhausted to do it myself, as usual.)
I will have to leave you now, because I have to chivvy that husband of mine, Malcolm Dumpling (who is asleep over there in the corner in his pet rocking chair) to mend the Stone Quarry roof before the next downpour. I daresay he will protest because of the wind. Well, never mind the wind, someone has to do it and I am too busy dutifully singing to the little rockies (and so, I hope, are you).
Autumn is the time for inventing indoor games of all kinds for the amusement of housebound pet rocks. Musical chairs might seem a good choice, but pet rocks are not in the least competitive and musical chairs is designed to upset someone every time the music stops. Pet rocks would rather stand still for ever than risk upsetting anyone else by grabbing the last chair. Try it for yourself, if you don’t believe me and think musical chairs is great fun, but you’ll have to forcibly lift them onto the chairs and be the one to cause the distress. Pass The Parcel is better, with a nice present every time the music stops, and as long as there are enough presents to go round and no one gets left out. The all-time favourite amusement is story-time, with you telling the story in fine detail. They love to remember fine details even if they are a complete fiction and make no sense. I leave it with you, Rubblers. Make up a new story every night and your pet rocks will be very very happy.
Despite all my prodding Malcolm is refusing to wake up, so I shall have to leave you while I go and get a bucket of water. I shall be here again next week and until then I remain your constantly dutiful chairman and damp little friend, Madge Dumpling.

Hello to all pet rock lovers worldwide, and welcome to the Rubble Club on this chilly day. You’ll soon warm up. Have a nice cup of gravel tea, here you are. Fish tank gravel has a nice sea-weedy flavour, doesn’t it? I think it’s my favourite.
Speaking of fish tanks, I have had a delightful little letter from one of my favourite new members, Tom Moffat, who, after my instructions last week, is obediently preparing himself a nice fish tank to entertain his pet rocks. Tom, when you return to Blackpool, Granny Gray has been ordered to fish out a nice shoal of Undergrowby minnows for you to take home in a plastic bag, if you still want them. You can also have the naughty pet rock from the bottom of our tank. He is born to be eternally grumpy, so give him a suitable scaring job, like guarding your fish tank from monsters, or release him on to dry land and promote him to chief security guard beside your front door.
Linedancer, (my head prefect) you have a new junior prefect, Tom Moffat from Scotland. Please be your kindest and make him welcome. Grandad Gray promoted him without referring to me but as it happens, it was an excellent decision. He is as bright as a button and a great asset to the Rubble Club already, isn’t he? He writes beautifully and seems to be prepared to go the extra mile for his little rockies, very much like your good trusty self, Linedancer.
Granny and Grandad Gray and all the rockies were pleased to see John, Jacob and Julie, your other junior prefects at the shop, Linedancer. When they come to the shop to shop, there is always a wriggling queue of rockies eager to be chosen by them because their home is a pet rock paradise zone, decked out with all a pet rock could wish for. The pet rocks know it and so do I.
I am somewhat exhausted and bleary-eyed this week. It’s not like me, and I am sure you are all anxious to know why. Well you see, I’m a morning-working person. Morning is my best and most energetic time of day and that’s when I like to be out and about gathering rock samples and exploring the lovely Blackpool buildings, meeting charming people on the seafront and in shops and hotels. I spend a lot of time listening in to the chatter of the numerous wandering crowds of Blackpool pigeons who are about my size and seem to know all the local gossip, what’s on in Blackpool, etc. That’s because they hang around outside the tourist information centre across from Blackpool Tower and listen to those lovely tourist informers,( Rubble Club members themselves,) telling the tourists where to go and what’s worth seeing today, every day. What those pigeons don’t know is not worth knowing. I take my notebook down to the pigeons and in exchange for a few crumbled rock cakes, they tell me all I need to know.
My mornings and afternoons are filled to the brim with all this work. You’d think that would be enough work for one Quarrymistress but now, during the Blackpool Illuminations season, the rockies expect me to take them out, a basketful at a time, every night, to view the lights. It has become their right, or so they seem to believe, now they have come to live in Blackpool. So, instead of falling asleep by the fire, as I like to do once the new pet rocks have hatched along my hearth, I have to get my coat on and tramp along the promenade with my open basket full of gleeful rockies till I am fit to drop. That is, of course, unless it is raining. They would not thank me for a drenching. Every night I find myself selfishly praying for rain, and that is not like me, is it, being selfish?
A couple of days ago the pigeons(with a knowing wink) recommended I visit a particular cocktail bar, so, curious to find out why, I did. There was a party going on. It was someone’s birthday, and it was a good job I popped in because although there were lots of nice presents, no one had thought to buy the young gentleman a birthday pet rock. How remiss of his friends and family! Luckily for them I was there to save the day, although no one thanked me when I clambered to the top of the pile of presents and placed a cute yellow rock in pride of place at the top. You’d think I was invisible! Anyway, ever quick to spot the small details in any situation, I found myself drawn with great interest to their cocktail glasses, into which someone had placed some tiny umbrellas. These umbrellas were obviously originally made for pet rocks, and lost their way in the post somehow, ending up abandoned in this cocktail bar. I cannot imagine why thesse people thought their drinks needed to be sheltered from the rain. Can’t they see it’s too late, drinks are already wet through and there is not a pet rock in sight.
So, as I seemed to be the only sensible one at the party, whenever anyone put down their glass, I snatched the umbrellas, folded them up and collected them under my arm. I have( you will be pleased to hear) returned them to their proper use, sheltering all the little rockies in my basket and yours from the sun and rain. I am now a regular visitor at that cocktail bar, frequented by dim, pet rockless people, where there seems to be an endless supply of pet rock umbrellas. As if I did not have enough work to do!
So, Rubble Clubbers, if you want an umbrella for your pet rock, just ask Granny Gray, my shopkeeper at the Magic Wand Factory Shop on Dickson Road, Blackpool. It’s a free service, one umbrella for every pet rock you buy. You will need to be brave enough to ask, however, because her memory is not what it used to be. For your pet rocks’ sake, speak up and remind her if she forgets to include one in the packaging. If you get yourself some of that sticky blue putty, you can secure them to the side of the pet rock nicely, whenever the weather dictates. There are lots of different colours. Don’t let Granny Gray fob you off with a dowdy grey one, (like herself). Ask to see the full range.
Right, Rubblers, and darling little rockies, while you mingle with each other and hold the fort here at the Stone Quarry, I will catch up with some sleep. I’ll just be over there in the corner on my pet rocking chair. Next week I’ll be here, devotedly chairing the meeting again, answering all your queries and sharing with you my pet rock pearls of wisdom. Till then I remain your tired, cold little friend and chairman, Madge Dumpling.