Meting of the Rubble Club 1st February 2009

Hello, pet rock owners, this is Madge Dumpling, Chairman of the Rubble Club of Undergrowby. Come on, bring your pet rocks in out of the cold, Rubble Clubbers, and welcome to another get-together with myself, my little rockies and the invisible world-wide pet rocking community. We are freezing cold, aren't we? Well, I bring good news. The human world, as you know, has only four seasons, but in Undergrowby, we Growbies have twelve seasons, and each season has its own sections, so every day is important to the annual cycle, if you want it to be.
For your information, it is now the Undergrowby season of the falling snowflakes, which marks the half-way turning point of the long winter sleep. Up to now, the Growbies(apart from myself, who am too busy to sleep, and Clockit Quick, the Time and Tide Inspector, whose job it is to stay awake and inspect everything) have been falling deeper and deeper asleep.
All that is about to change, because as soon as the snowflakes fall, Clockit Quick blows his whistle and the winter sporters (endurance sleeping competitors), must stop going deeper and deeper and start to come out of the sleeping state. By the dawn of spring, on that very morning when the first of the thorn bushes opens its first blossom, the sleeping competitors must be sure to wake up punctually, on the dot, and break out of their winter cocoons. To prove they are awake they must rush outside and wave their own personal flag for the attention of Mr Quick. He announces the winning sleeping champion in his annual report which is published the next day in the Undergrowby Gnews.
You would think my husband, Malcolm, would win the prize every year, because he has me to wake him up, but he is too dozy to get out of his cocoon and wave his flag. I have cheated so many times, dressing up as Malcolm and waving his flag, that I have been disqualified from the competition for life. That Clockit Quick's eyesight is too sharp for his own good. It is lucky, therefore, that we Dumplings have other extraordinary talents for which we can win prizes. I have invented a wide range of Rubble Club competitions and prizes of my own for that very purpose, some of which I have already mentioned and you have failed to enter, Rubble Clubbers, leaving me as sole competitor. Never mind. all the more prizes for me.
During the week I have had invisible visits from my head prefect Linedancer, whose kind heart I have come to rely upon. Ah, here she is again. Move along, Rubble Clubbers and let Linedancer have that spot on the couch nearest to the fire. She hasn't been well, and has struggled along here with her bag full of pampered, but hatless pet rocks despite her poorly ankle, hoping to catch Auntie Hatty's pet rock hat shop open. Sadly, we are in invisible cyber-space and not in the Magic Wand Factory Shop on Dickson Road, Blackpool, and I do not hold the key from one to the other. as well as the hat shop, my pet rocks' cake shop is now open in the M. W. F. Shop, and I have a few delicious, crunchylicious samples for you all here at the meeting. Enjoy! All the ingredients were sourced locally(picked from the beach) and mixed with a few magical flakes from Linda from Kilmarnoch's Scottish oat food parcel, which I have secreted in the wardrobe in my spare room in case of jealous, competitive bakers(like myself) raiding my pantry in search of my peculiar ingredients. They would steal my recipes as soon as look at me, but as yet, although others have copied many of my other rubblicious ingredients, I am the only baker in Undergrowby who has ever even heard of Scottish oats! I like to keep them all guessing.
Linda, I am glad you have now got a map of Undergrowby and I hope you have located my home at the Stone Quarry in the Rocky Headlands, across the lane from Clockit Quick, the Time and Tide Inspector due north in the Watery Wetlands. Next time you visit the shop, Linda, get Granny Gray to show you how to use the map to steer your life's directions, as it does my own. There are secret readings for every destination, available to be borrowed by Rubble Clubbers for the asking. Meanwhile, just for fun, write to me and tell me your map number and I will tell you where on the map you would belong if you were a Growby like me.
To calculate your map number, try to remember the year you were born...19??. If you can't remember, ask your pet rocks, they will know. Those two last numbers in your birth year are the important ones. Add them together and keep adding them together until you arrive at a single digit number. For instance, if it were 1999, you would add 9 and9 to get 18, then add 1 and 8 to get nine. Then subtract that single digit number from 10 to get your map number, which in this case would be 10-9=1. That is the number of the Watery Wetlands, where the fearless, hard working Growbies live, who have plenty of back. The map number of the Stone Quarry is 8, and we Rocky Headlanders are thinkers, dependable and strong like our mountain home, with a sweet tooth and a fondness for the earth's history, embedded in its rocks. If you were born before the 3rd of February, you use the previous year's date to do your calculations because our calendars are different from yours.
And now I must retire to my writing room and leave you to mingle with each other while you demolish the cake samples and drink my teapot dry, because I am writing down all my pet rock bedtime stories for the benefit of pet rocks everywhere, once they have left my care. You will all be needing a copy, I know, so I must not delay. However, I will return next week to chair the meeting as reliably as ever and meanwhile I remain your devoted little friend, Madge Dumpling.