Rubble Club Archives

 Hello, Rubble Clubbers. One day while I was under the shop counter, listening in to Granny Gray, my shopkeeper, gossiping away to the customers I heard her ask a pet rock customer if she was reading my words of wisdom every week, like pet rock owners are expected to do. The young lady said she couldn’t be bothered with “all that writing” with no pictures to make it interesting. Well! In case there are more picture-needers out there I have concocted a new way of sharing the Dumpling magic with you all. It has taken me all week, and I am covered in paint so next time it may be smaller because while I paint pictures, the pet rocks are being neglected. Hope you like it. I will always be your world famous chairman and artistic friend, Madge Dumpling.

No wonder you’re shivering, Rubble Clubbers, and streaming with colds, it’s chilly today, (unusual for Blackpool, I know!). Good job the Quarrymaster, my husband Malcolm, has lit the fire. It’s  roaring away nicely thanks to my excellent new invention which have called  “Firelighters”.  Last week I called them twig-dust rock cakes but now they have dried out I have changed their name. Hello and welcome to all newcomers! I am Madge Dumpling, Quarrymistress of the Stone Quarry of Undergrowby, Chairman of the Rubble Club and expert on all things to do with pet rocks. Now you have found me you will never have to wonder again about your pet rock’s few, but very special needs. Just hang upon my every word and you will not go wrong. This week we will be concentrating on winter care.

Apart from making sure that there is plenty of fluff and dust in your pet rock’s bed to shield him/her from the draughts, I expect you have obediently knitted(or stitched, or glued) him/her a nice cosy winter cocoon, as I instructed last week. I must point out that most pet rocks do not hibernate when they are in their winter cocoons, but they like to pretend to. It’s one of their favourite winter games. As they do not close their eyes it is hard to tell when they are truly asleep, so when placing them in their cocoons, DO NOT COVER THEIR EYES, EVER, because they are busybodies and (like myself), would hate to miss anything. If you are wondering how to keep the top of their heads warm, try a hat, or make them a little wig out of fluff, wool or anything that comes to hand. At this point, I must point out to those of you who have bought your pet rocks pet air plants that you, especially, will have to keep your pet rock’s head covered otherwise they will be inviting their air plant to perch on top of them at any opportunity. You know how kind and accommodating pet rocks are, especially to their pet air plants, but there will come a time when pet air plants need watering and once they are anchored in permanently on top of a rock the water will run down all over the little rocky and his bed and cocoon and everything will be damp for ages. Horrid thought! If your rocky has a hat or a wig on at all times there is no danger to the pet rock and the air plant will still be having fun, perched on top of something. A selection of pet rock hats and wigs are on sale in the Magic Wand Factory Shop on DicksonRoad, Blackpool. Take your pet rock along and my shop assistant, Granny Gray, will do a proper fitting for you.

I must now make a sad announcement. The Blackpool Illuminations are being switched off tonight, so please do not set off with your pet rocks in a basket to see them until next year. This final week there has been wind and rain(which makes umbrellas useless) so, despite pleading looks, I have refused to take a party of rocks for their three hour evening stroll up and down the promenade. Half an hour is all I could stand. Then they have had to be content to listen to one of my bedtime stories by lamplight for the rest of the evening. Luckily, being the best natured of creatures, they are easily content.

When the chill comes into the air like it has this week it heralds the coming of the White Mist, the season when the Growbies (inhabitants of Undergrowby) exchange gifts with their friends and neighbours before they climb into their cocoons and bed cupboards and go to sleep ready for winter to set in. I shall be heading off soon around and about with my basket full of firelighters, which I have made specially for the occasion.  I will take a few orphan pet rocks with me just in case someone has a vacancy on a windowsill somewhere. I like to spread joy wherever I go. It’s my magical Dumpling nature.

Linda from Kilmarnoch, I am glad you are a chatty member of the Rubble Club, because without you chirping up every week I could imagine I am talking to myself. One of you others, please try to make yourself heard. Press the Register button down at the left hand side there, then you can log in to make a little speech to the membership.  Don’t be shy. Winter is coming and Undergrowby is a very lonely time for me in the winter once everyone else is asleep. My husband Malcolm is no use. He can hardly keep his eyes open at the best of times. By next week he’ll be snoring away. Company is what I need now if you want me to survive till spring.

Depending upon your kind support and friendship, I am hoping to be here next week for whoever knocks on the door. Meanwhile I remain your stoicly dutiful chairman and shivering friend, Madge Dumpling.

In you come, Rubble Clubbers. This is Madge Dumpling, chairman of the Rubble Club, world-famous pet rock whisperer and baker of fine cakes. This week’s spectacular twig-dust-enriched rock cakes are piled sky high and the gravel tea is simmering away on the stove. Yes, the stove! I have even had the stove lit for you, Rubblers although the sun is shining gloriously outside (as is to be expected here in sunny Blackpool). Take your sunglasses off and sit down on the cosy, crunchy couch. No, don’t take your coats off because I’ll have to open the door and let the draught in for the air plants if you don’t mind. They are going dry and curly with the heat. If they die, the pet rocks(whose pets they are) will sink into a depression, and we can’t have that! Could one of you prefects spray them with water for me before you sit down please? Make sure the pet rocks have got their umbrellas up first though. We don’t want them catching cold.

While Hazel was job swapping with me she wheedled her way round Granny Gray, my doddery old shopkeeper with gifts of plants, vegetables and fruits from the plantation. Now Granny Gray has accepted a massive delivery of air plants from the Spring Green and they have taken over an entire cupboard across the room from my Pet Rock Emporium in the Magic Wand Factory Shop on Dickson Road, Blackpool. If I don’t keep an eye on things she will be selling Hazel’s trees and bowls of nettle soup next. I have told her, “Enough is enough!” I had wanted to take over that cupboard myself to expand my pet rock empire. Trying to appease me she has placed a few pet rocks in amongst the air plants but it’s not enough! Slowly but surely I will be sneaking a few more in as the weeks go by. It is my duty!

I hope your pet rocks had a nice Halloween party, much like mine. We had a lovely broomstick-making competition. There were twigs everywhere. I even had to sweep up (well, my husband Malcolm did) or risk being twigtangled. Being twigtangled is an ailment common only in the eastern Undergrowby gnomesteads of  the Spring Green and the Wandmakers’ Forest, and it is caused by repeatedly tripping up over twigs. The symptoms of twigtangling are very nasty,… bad temper, shoutiness, windy indigestion, sprains, bossiness, stiff necks, red eyes and green skin. You wouldn’t want it, and you wouldn’t want your pet rocks catching it, would you? So the sweeping had to be done, but what can you do with all that twig dust? The answer to that question is hidden somewhere in paragraph one. It’s a quiz! Enjoy! If anyone comes in the shop and tells Granny Gray the answer, you will be immediately promoted to a prefect, and given a prefect’s badge.

Thank-you, Linda from Kilmarnoch, my deputy head prefect, for your lovely “Welcome Home!” message, which, I confess, I half-expected. Your beautiful little Scottish postcard collection is a constant source of delight for the customers at the Magic Wand Factory Shop. Granny Gray won’t let any customer out of the door before they have thumbed through it carefully. Your name is always on her lips and she is eagerly awaiting your next visit.

Soon it will be the season of the White Mist, when all the other Growbies except me and Clockit Quick, the Time and Tide Inspector who lives across the road in the Watery Wetlands, tuck themselves up in their winter cocoons and go to sleep till spring. Some pet rocks like to hibernate and some don’t. If yours does, and you are a good stitcher, knitter or gluer, you might like to be thinking about making him/her a warm little winter cocoon sleeping bag. Every year, Undergrowby sleeps while I work my fingers to the bone. Well, the tide keeps coming in, bringing all those drenched, gasping rock samples. Someone has to rescue them, and they can’t hatch themselves out, can they?  It’s lucky I am not selfish and dozy like everybody else. Now I have all you invisible humans(with your funny little ways) to talk to, and the Rubble Club to run, so my winters are not so lonely as they used to be when Undergrowby was in the middle of nowhere.

It’s lovely to be home again with you all, dear Rubblers. Its so reassuring to have you clinging to my every word and eating my world-famous rock cakes once again.  The rock cakes are, in fact,  not disappearing as fast as I expected. Perhaps they are a bit short of grit and too rich in splinters? Chew hard, Rubblers. You can do it. If you don’t like them, never mind,… what you leave will be good for lighting the fire next week.

And so another week comes to an end and I will leave you here and now to enjoy each other’s pet rocks’ company.  I shall open my doors to you all again next week. Until then, I remain your happy little Chairman and busy friend, Madge Dupling.