Rubble Club Archives

Hello, this is Madge Dumpling your windswept Chairman speaking. You have arrived in the breezy doorway of the parlour of my temporary headquarters (an old upturned pram in a pile of rubble on Blackpool’s Central Promenade). I know you expected it to be the Stone Quarry of Undergrowby where all the Undergrowby pet rocks are born, but for once I am unable to get time off one of my part-time jobs so the venue has been changed. This morning, as well as hosting the Rubble Club Meeting, I am also in sole charge of digging operations here on the Prom. I often have to do two or more things at once, and this is one of those times. I am quite indispensable to the promenade building team because no one manages a rubble pile quite like me. Those big mechanical diggers can wreak havoc in the wrong hands. I have to watch them like a hawk or they would mess up the rubble. I make sure it is stacked neatly in orderly piles of small, medium and large rocks, with all the sand swept into one giant heap for the building of pet rock sandcastles. I go through all the small rocks picking out those I know will make nice pet rocks, then I tell the builders(who lack my world-famous expertise, but are not completely useless) to make a nice new promenade with the rest. It has taken me all year to sort it all out, but there is not far to go now.

Do the best you can to enjoy yourselves, Rubble Clubbers. There will be line-dancing later, and news of the latest competition. One of you could nip over to the Golden Mile and get some chips and a bag of those (mysteriously popular) soft doughnuts for the buffet. I did find a few in a bin but my friends the Promenade pigeons scoffed them all earlier when they came to exchange gossip with me. (I thought they only befriended me for my world famous rock cake crumbs but I am now beginning to suspect they will eat anything). The gravel tea, thanks to Malcolm, my husband,  is stewing merrily on the stove over there, (my Promenade blend) so there will be no need to bring any pop. The Promenade builders, who are expert tea drinkers, are growing fond of my special beverages and I dare say they will be sorry when the job (and my promenade catering) is over. They want my recipes (who doesn’t?)but I have told them they will just have to buy a pet rock so they can attend the Rubble Club and partake of my rubblicious buffets in the future if they want to keep their taste buds alive.  (Well, we have to get the membership figures up somehow.)

Suz, one of my favourite prefects, remembered me and sent me this beautiful postcard that she made for me on her holiday in St. Ives, (a holiday resort with a pier and seals which is nowhere near Blackpool and with far less sun of course). Thank you Suz, for introducing your pet rocks to the seals, and for your sunset memories captured so hauntingly on your(now my) lovely card.

No one has written to me on-line this week, but I am too proud of Suz’s card to feel sorry for myself. Anyway, the Blackpool Illuminations will soon be switched on and I have a promenade to build before that can happen. No matter how busy I am however I always make time to check the on-line postbag, but this week it was empty and I expect I know why.  I dare say all you Rubble Club members forgot to write to me because you are too busy making your pet rock boats  for this month’s competition. I understand. Don’t forget, those of you have not started on your entries, you can win a pet rock boating pool if you are the outright winner. The boat you select for your entry, (you may have found it in a shop or in a bin or you may have made it yourself) has to float, and be big enough to take at least one pet rock on a trip around a boating pool. If you want to see the entries brought into the shop so far, Grandad Gray has photographed them here below. I have not got enough clay to make a boating pool prize for everyone, but everyone who enters will win something delightful, whatever treasures I can dig out from under the rubble.

Here they are, starting with my own entry, a scary floating lily pad modelled by one of my keenest pet rock sailors, Dribbler,(he can’t close his mouth) and his lucky friend, Lucky Ducky. This rather fetching boat of mine comes with a health warning…”Do not set sail in this boat on the open sea without blu tack, no matter how much the sun is shining!”

And next comes Ellie’s entry, less scary than mine, but is that a bad thing?

and here is Emily’s lovely romantic swan boat decked with leaves and polythene sheeting.

Both the girls’ entries are, I have to admit, sturdier, more attractive and less scary than mine, but I tried my best. Perhaps I did not try hard enough, but after all, I have all my other frightfully important jobs to do. If a few more entries come in soon I will get Granny Gray to stick them all on the Rubble Club notice board in the Magic Wand Factory Shop on Dickson Road, Blackpool, near Gynn Square, for the customers and visitors to judge which is the best. Even if no more entries come in I will still have them stuck on the board and the girls will win. I know when I am beaten.

My expertise has been in such high demand in so many different places this week that I have had no time to do the Undergrowby Gazette or to go to the football match to hand out more tangerine pet rocks to the Blackpool football supporters.  I only hope the Blackpool fans have sent a pet-rock-collecting-prefect round to the shop to collect their own. As we all know, good luck does not just make itself, after all! The tangerine pet rocks have to get to the match before they can work their magic! They are no use sitting on the shop windowsill!

And so I leave you to tuck into the chips and doughnuts and get back on with digging up the Promenade. Till next week, I remain your dusty Chairman and truly devoted friend, Madge Dumpling.