Rubble Club Archives

Hello everyone, pet rock owners and your little pets and also wandering magic wand collectors. I am Madge Dumpling, pet rock whisperer and Chairman of the Rubble Club. Wanderella’s Weekend Web is closed for the winter, so all its disappointed, invisible cyber-space visitors may instead be joining us here at the Stone Quarry. Rubble Clubbers, be on your best behaviour please. Rockies, no rattling or scowling please! We don’t want to scare them off the minute they come through the door, do we? I have plenty of pet rock adoption papers at the ready, and double the usual rock cakes and gravel tea(cold, sorry), so I am hoping for a good turn-out.
Don’t bother to take off your coats, Rubble Clubbers, because the fire is out. Smoking chimneys would alert the Time and Tide Inspector to my activities, so I am saving my secret stash of fuel for magical emergencies. We Growbies are supposed to stay asleep in our bed cupboards snuggled inside warm winter cocoons, but for those who suffer bouts of wakefulness, like myself, we Growbies have winter breathing techniques for internal warming in cold weather, which you will learn from me as the weeks progress. Meanwhile, keep your coats on.
Straight on to this week’s magical breathing programme without delay. Pet rocks need not be taught the techniques, they are born with them ingrained into their nature. No, Rubble Clubbers, I am sharing my Dumpling breathing programme with your good selves in exchange for the work you do for the pet rocks in your care. You may observe your clever pet rocks demonstrating the internal mind-breath stillness techniques for you, but it will be a while before you are able to master the technique as well as them. We are only on lesson two, after all.
Lesson one , opening the belly, was described in last weeks notes.

LESSON TWO…”Finding the cauldron, Filling the cauldron and Finding the dumpling.”

Finding the cauldron.
Last week, you mastered the art of filling the belly with the heavenly dumpling-forming magic of the breath, so there is a nice, powerful feeling in the belly where once there was very little. Now we are going to learn how and where to direct the dumpling-forming power so we can use it.
At the bottom of the belly there is a curved vessel-shaped space, where the belly ends and before the legs begin. It fills the whole lower ground floor of the belly between the sitting bones, hips, tailbone and front pubic bone, and nestled within the bones of this vessel-shaped space, imagine a large, invisible, flexible, magical cauldron containing a condensed drop or two of my fabulous invisible gravel soup. Once you have located it, you will wonder why you had never noticed it before.

Filling the Cauldron.
As you breathe in, imagine that, along with the breath, more soup is funnelled down into the bottom of the cauldron, and as you breathe out, feel the swirling, magical sensation in your belly as the contents settle. In your mind, poke around inside the cauldron to see if there are any empty spaces. Different parts of the cauldron relate to different parts of the body and mind. For instance, if there is an empty gap right at the bottom, it would refer to the lower organs, perhaps the bladder or large intestine. Concentrate on filling up all such gaps to balance the body and mind, and leave you as well rounded and stable as a pet rock. A few breaths later you may feel that the cauldron is full enough for you to move to stage three,” finding the dumpling”.

Finding the Dumpling.
If you are doing the exercise right, a magical thing will happen. A solid, dumpling-like object will appear in the middle of the soup. It was always there but you were unaware of it. Once you get your mind in your belly, you will find the dumpling. It usually appears midway between your front and back, just below the tummy button, deep within the midst of the soup, during the time between the out-breath and the in-breath.
So, as you breathe out slightly squeeze the tummy muscles on all sides. Pull up your bottom muscles as if you were trying not to go to the toilet. The dumpling will resist the squeeze and then you will have located it. The more you practice the squeezing breath, the smaller, more condensed, solid and strong the dumpling will become, like a tiny pet rock. Between now and next week, work on squeezing and rounding your dumpling until it is so small it almost disappears. It is a magical tool which only you can create and perfect….a tool which cannot be bought….a tool which is part of you undiscovered till this magical moment. It will deliver to you powers of health, vitality and working with the invisible. When you have the feeling that the dumpling is at least as small as a pea, we can progress to the next stage, “Warming the cauldron” and “Empowering the dumpling.” That will be next week’s lesson. Until then I remain your helpful little friend and dutiful chairman, Madge Dumpling.

Hello to all pet rocks and their owners, this is Madge Dumpling, your friendly chairman welcoming you to the Rubble Club. Nobody has been through my door all week because everyone else is probably asleep. I am hoping some of you invisible cyber space members, (like my wonderful head prefect, Linedancer, who writes such a lovely letter), are here somewhere inside the back of my magic laptop, to keep me and the rockies company. I have just had an idea! I am popping up the lane to Wanderella Windmeddler’s house to put a note on the door, telling everyone she is asleep and to come round to my house instead. Well, if she can’t be bothered to stay awake, she doesn’t deserve loyalty. Once they have tasted my rock cakes they will be mine for ever. The Rubble Club is a welcoming haven of delights for everyone, even wand collectors.
They won’t be there till weekend, so I am postponing the Rubble Club meeting till then for the foreaseeable future. Then, Rubblers, we shall continue the Dumpling breathing exercises which I started last week. Linedancer, I am sorry to tell you that you have missed the White Mist gift exchange. It only happens during the season of the White Mist, just before the long winter sleep, hence its name. I was expecting you then, punctual and dutiful as you uasually are, but you were not to be seen so I thought you had forgotten me. I have, however, saved you a little something, which I will give you when you call in. Think yourself lucky I am not asleep like your other friend, Wanderella Windmeddler.
Till tomorrow, this is Madge Dumpling busily signing out as I set off to steal us a few more members. Please make sure you return for the breathing practice.

Hello, this is Madge Dumpling, chairman of the Rubble Club, speaking to you from a very cool parlour in the Stone Quarry of Undergrowby. I have lit an oil lamp in the middle of the hearth where the fire should be, so you can all warm your hands. If I were to light a proper fire, the Time and Tide Inspector would spot the smoke rising from my chimney and immediately record the Stone Quarry’s ‘ irresponsible waste of fuel’ in the scandal column of his annual report, so I have to keep fire-lighting to a minimum during the long winter sleep. Only we dedicated Rubble Club members need to be aware I am awake,( and fully in support of pet rocks and their owners world-wide), to save any more gossip than necessary.
I know what you are thinking…no fire…what about those freshly-baked rock cakes you have grown so fond of, and when will they be back on the buffet table? Well, fear not, Rubblers, because I have thought well ahead and my secret pantry is full of them, stored in stone jars, enough to last for months. They may develop an interesting wintery flavour from being stored because of the different crusty moulds which develop over time. The buffet will, however, have to be served cold for the foreseeable future. Do help yourselves!
I am pleased to see you and your little rockies have all survived Waterfall Week unscathed and so have I. Now, as all activity ceases around us, it is time for the magical inner work to begin. You already have the ideal teachers in your midst. Pet rocks, under my Dumpling-method form of tuition have perfected the magical art of winter stillness breathing and if asked, will model the age-old technique for you to copy. See, there they are on my mantelpiece doing it as we speak.
By faithful practice they have learnt how to compact the breath in their bellies using their strong muscles and even stronger minds, so that very little movement is required to supply all the magical needs of the overwintering re-charge. Their breathing movement is so slight it is imperceptible. You might think it has stopped altogether, but the movement has simply transferred itself to the mind for the duration of the winter. Eager students and fast learners as pet rocks are, they are now more skillful at the technique than I am myself, who inherited it reluctantly from a long line of outstanding Dumpling masters. Perhaps an ancient pet rock was the truly original creator of the form and an ancient Dumpling magician liked it and decided to take credit for it. I sometimes wonder.
Over the wintery weeks I will share the Dumpling magic breathing technique with you, if you are having trouble understanding how it works. The first thing to practice is belly-work. That begins with thinking about the middle and lower belly opening and closing with each breath. While your mind is in your lower belly no one will be able to push you over because you will be bottom-heavy. It’s a handy thing to practise when you are holding a ladder for somebody. It is a useful antidote to fear.
Rubblers, I suspect a simple form of lower belly breathing is enough for you to practise for the first week. You may be doubting that it is a truly magical technique. Well you can prove it for yourself. If you have a friend or family member who is awake for the winter, tell them to stand behind you. First, think about the top of your head as you breathe and imagine the breath-magic filling the topmost part of your skull. Get your friend to give you a little push from behind and you will find you are so top heavy you will start to topple forwards right away.
Next, think about your lower belly and focus all the magical breath action there. Get your friend to push you again and see how much more bottom-heavy and stable you are, just like a pet rock. That’s how powerfully your mind can move matter. Do not underestimate the power of the mind and breath combined. Together they are a force to be reckoned with. It gets better, Rubble Clubbers, but this is your starting point in the Dumping school of belly breath control. Open up that belly of yours to the forces of magic and over the winter, as the technique unfolds, you will learn how to move mountains in a quiet, unassuming and truly magical way, much like myself.
Right, it’s time to go and get back in my cocoon, read the Undergrowby Gnews again and again and do a bit of knitting. If the weather turns nasty I will be joining you in the belly breathing session, (advanced form, of course). It distracts me nicely from having to listen to the drip-drip-dripping of the rain.
It was lovely to reunite with you all in secret cyber-space. I perfectly understand that nobody wanted to write to me in the gloom and doom of Waterfall Week, but now it is over, please start writing again. I look forward to your words of comfort, sympathy, praise and support, which you know I truly deserve. Enjoy your introductory breathing exercises and we’ll move to the more exciting second stage next week. Be warm until then. I remain your cosily-cocooned friend and Rubble Club Chairman, Madge Dumpling.

Hello, this is Madge Dumpling welcoming all pet rocks everywhere to another get-together, and of course all you pet rock owners out there in cyber space who have not yet entered the long winter sleep. Welcome, all of you to my deathly quiet parlour here in the Stone Quarry! Ah, winter is a frightfully quiet time for a wide-awake Growby like myself, what with all that sleeping going on all around. It’s lucky I have you and my rockies to talk to. If only they could make an intelligible sound in return instead of just rattling,… but then they would not be true to their nature, and life would not be the same, and I would not be Madge Dumpling.
It seems the humans here in Blackpool are very forgetful. Despite sensibly remembering to switch off the Blackpool Illuminations, not only have they forgotten to go to sleep for the winter, they have forgotten that this is the dreaded Waterfall Week. Anyone still awake and wandering around outside in Waterfall Week is tempting bad luck and all manner of disasters to descend upon them. However, here in Blackpool there are still humans out there strolling around as if it were just any other week! No wonder it has been raining and blowing a gale all week! No wonder I hear arguing, shouting, banging, tripping and falling, cars crashing and babies crying! Well, what do they expect?
All you Rubble Clubbers will have remembered to stay indoors of course, because you have your memory banks (your little rockies) to remind you, and they know off-by-heart all the important dates, Undergrowby seasons and time-patterns of the sun moon and stars. Experienced pet rock keepers have only to hold their pet rocks to their foreheads for the thought transfer to take place and the knowledge to be imparted. Perhaps I ought to write down the Undergrowby calendar for the benefit of all those poor humans out there who have no pet rocks to remind them, and also for those Rubble Clubbers who have not quite got the hang of the thought-transfer technique. (It just takes time and practice, practuice, practice!) In case I never finish writing the calendar, please bring your notebooks to the Rubble Club meetings and take notes from my wise words as the year unfolds, then, by next year, you will have the complete picture and can write your own.
No, my rockies have more sense than to expect to go for a walk during the dark, dangerous days of Waterfall Week, and like nothing better than to sit wrapped in their blankets and knitted hats with their backs to the world, pretending to be asleep, much like myself. Waterfall Week is Mother Nature’s way of scaring everyone indoors and into their cocoons for the long winter sleep, in case they should have failed to respect the warnings of the season of the White Mist. Winter is a very frightening season, slippery, cold and wet, especially in the gnomestead known as the Watery Wetlands, just north and west of here, and most especiallyh during Waterfall Week. It is very dangerous to health, especially the bones, teeth, bladder and kidneys.
It’s obvious why.
Bones get broken when you fall over on the ice, teeth get hurt and broken chattering together in the frosty air, bladders let you down when you take a tumble and wet your pants. Your kidneys, amongst dealing with the waterworks and power source, store the magical life essences (which had better not freeze up or you’re dead). Only the bravest and most magical of us goes out in winter, even after the dreaded Waterfall Week, and I, as you know, am one of them. I get wrapped up in my thick brown winter shawl, carry only one specimen at a time and I walk very slowly and carefully, holding onto the walls as I go. If you are brave enough to go out in winter, I hope you do the same. It is one of the secrets of a long life.
Help yourselves to last week’s rock cakes and cold tea. I am sorry the fire is out, but it is bad luck to cook and light fires during Waterfall Week, as you probably know. We are expected to be in our winter cocoons at all times, or risk being accused of irresponsible conduct. Clockit Quick, the Time and Tide Inspector, ever watchful over us all, would spot the smoke from my chimney and ring the alarm bells if I dared to defy the Waterfall Week Rules of Conduct. My name would go down in his annual report in the ‘Shamed’ column, for all to read about in next year’s Undergrowby Gnews.
Never mind, Rubblers, I know you are disappointed there is no smell of charred, smoking rock cakes in the air, but I have a big stone jar full of the aforesaid last week’s rock cakes and a few flagons of cold tea at the ready for you, Rubble Clubbers. I know how you like your little treats. I am pleased to see you have your little pets wrapped up warmly and glowing with contentment from the kindness and love you have shown them. That is all they will ask of you for the scary weeks ahead. Keep them safe and they will keep you safe and lucky through the winter. A happy pet rock, as you know, makes a lucky home (except for this week. Waterfall Week’s dangers are more than even a pet rock can ward off). That being said, take care and hold onto the wall when you leave, and when you get home, jump straight into your cocoons and stay there until next week, when you must, of course, return. Until then, I remain your stoic little friend and dutiful chairman, Madge Dumpling.

Hello Rubble Clubbers and your rocky little friends, and welcome to the Stone Quarry of Undergrowby. I have set up a nice warm, welcoming sand-pit for visiting pet rocks on the mantlepiece today, so if you please, place your own little friends in the sand next to the pet rocks of their choice and then your hands will be free to help yourselves to the buffet. While they have a good old sand-bathing session, we have your old favourites, rock cakes and gravel tea, and a little extra treat, gritty baps for you to toast on the fire for extra crispiness. The fire is glowing, ready for you. Get comfy and watch the pet rocks mingling on the mantlepiece. It’s heavenly, isn’t it? Home from home.
Well, the White Mist finally descended this week. It started at the weekend and lasted for three or four days. The last of the White Mist gifts were exchanged in the final hugging festivities and then the Belly-breathing Ceremony began. (The White Mist, as you probably know, contains all the vital heavenly essences needed to help us through the winter, so only a fool would not take a good bellyful of it.) Last minute preparations are then made for the big shut-down. Fuel supplies, roots and water are brought indoors. Parlour games and the Undergrowby Gnewspaper are placed in a handy spot next to the bed cupboard in case of wakefulness and the cocoons are brought out.
The entire population of Growbies are now, as I speak, tightly wrapped in their winter cocoons and Undergrowby has officially gone to sleep for the winter. All except for me. I just pretend to go to sleep. It’s my guilty secret and I will now share it with you, Rubble Clubbers. Please keep it in confidence.
Ever since I inherited the Dumpling family secret, (the pet rock-making magic), I have been a fitful sleeper. In fact I hardly sleep at all, which is a shamefully weak thing for a Growby to confess. In Undergrowby, extreme winter sleeping is considered a prize-winning virtue. Endurance sleeping is the only winter sport Growbies will even consider. You know me, Rubblers, I like my competitions, and would dearly love to compete in the sleeping competitions, but there is no point even entering unless I can be the outright winner, as I used to be in my youth.
When the trouble first started I sought help from Doc Leaf, but he can do nothing for it except to recommend that I go easy on the rock cakes and gravel tea, but what kind of nonsense is that? Does he want me to starve? No, I am resigned to be without hope and completely on my own(except for the pets, and now your good selves) with my secret. In between little cocoon naps in the bed cupboard next to my snoring husband, Malcolm, I am doomed to roam the lanes of Undergrowby alone till spring, checking up on this and that, unnoticed by anyone. Since we moved to Blackpool, human activity is all around us, so the lanes are not entirely empty now. There is still much for me to see and do.
Most of the humans have disappeared for the winter (no doubt they are at home asleep in their bed cupboards hoping to win their own sleeping competitions). The pigeons are still waddling around the promenade eating chips, I notice, and there are a few human families strolling dreamily along the beautiful Blackpool promenade, kindly sharing their chips with the pigeons as they search for the Magic Wand Factory Shop. It is a secret shop tucked tantalisingly away at the end of Dickson Road, far away from the town centre and only the fittest and most magical of the humans will ever find it, which will be a great disappointment to many.
I now have a news report for you. Last night, the whole town had a shock! Some wicked, rowdy humans lit a bonfire and without notice, set off a banging, crashing firework display. Just because they are hopeless sleepers, like myself, (and obviously not taking part in the sleeping competitions), does not give them the right to spoil others’ chances, does it?
I was already awake of course, but I blew out my candle and jumped into my cocoon, pretending I was asleep in case anyone should call round to blame me for the noise(they know how I love a bonfire and a firework display). Indeed, I just wish I had been warned about it in advance, because the rockies love a bonfire too, and they would have been delighted to watch the fireworks, especially now since the Blackpool Illuminations have been switched off in polite respect for for the long winter sleep.
All in all, it was a very frustrating time and has left me in a bad temper. Those pigeons, my so-called friends, might have notified me. It’s at times like this that you find out who your friends really are! I bet they were all there themselves, pecking round at all that bonfire food! Rubblers, if you hear of any bonfire parties going on through the winter, please send me, your friend, an invitation, but do not invite the pigeons!
Now, on to business. I know what your chief concerns will be at the moment, Rubble Clubbers. Now that the Blackpool Illuminations have been switched off, how can you inspire your pet rocks with the will to live and survive their most hated season, winter. Winter hobbies are the solution, Rubblers, and preferably really boring ones, boring enough to send them to sleep over and over again. I Spy is one of my favourites. As I am the only one who can speak, it is always my turn, and guess which letter is my favourite? Yes that’s right,… R. The rockies love it, because they always guess the answer, and they know I know they know. Then I pretend to hear someone answer, and I clap and present someone with a prize (a pat on the head).
Another favourite pet rock hobby is reading. I read and they listen. I read them the Undergrowby Gnews over and over again. It’s always a winner. Cooking is another one. I cook and they watch. Dried root soup is the traditional winter dish in Undergrowby, but now we are in Blackpool, I may bring back a few more exciting ingredients for the cookery game from the bins behind the hotels. Potato peelings and eggshells are some of the delicacies I have learned to select. They give the dried root soup that extra crunchy, rocky, lumpy texture we in the Stone Quarry know and love. Pet rocks love to paddle in it.
Sometimes the rockies are extra-irritable on windy days in winter, much like myself. I can tell because they start to rattle in the draught. Then I set up the draughts board and line them up in teams of light and dark to play off against each other. It wears them out nicely,… and that is why a draughts board is called a draughts board of course. It was originally invented in Undergrowby as a distracting pet rock winter hobby at times of high wind.
If you come up with any new winter sports for your pet rocks, please share them with the other Rubble Club members. (Post me a comment if you are clever enough to work out how).There will be a fabulous prize for the best one.
I will leave you with that job while I wander down to the Wandmaker’s Forest to see if Wanderella Windmeddler has already shut up shop for the winter. She usually leaves a few dozen free magic wands outside for desperate winter visitors to choose from, and I like to take my pick first. I never shop there at any other time because we don’t get on very well, as you know. She’s such a copycat. When she heard about my laptop she had to have one, and now, when she has a made a weekend web in cyberspace and is receiviing regular visitors, she just goes to sleep and leaves them to cater for themselves. It’s selfish! I’m going to see if there is a queue outside and if there is I will tell them to go home for the winter.
So I will leave you now, Rubble Clubbers, and I will be back next Friday, depend upon it. They don’t call me Wanderella! Until we meet again. I remain your irritated little friend and devoted chairman, Madge Dumpling.