the world according to eric (that's me!)

hornets

after the excitement of the hair cut day rupert decided that he and i should get out a bit more. he says we used to have far more fun that we do now and he thinks it's because i've become "too woossy" and "worrying about everything".

told him i was not woossy at all - who was it that stood up to the screaming barnsheets that time?? - but rupert maintained that nicking their food after they'd gone on the rampage hardly counts as a feat of courage.

rupert is wrong.

i started to tell him so but he was having none of it. he says we've become "too cosy" and "middle aged" and we need to live life "on the edge again".

i suggested a game of peeling looks or even blowing in the wind - but that's hardly living life on the edge.

apparently.

he's even suggested we should cut back on the gingernuts as they symbolize what we have become.

apparently.

had a long hard look at the gingernut i keep behind my ear for emergencies. it looks nothing like me. or rupert. other than the fluff.

so now i don't know what to do for the best. went to see jill - who's poorly at present - and she reminded me that rupert always gets like this in the summer. jill says it's a lergic reaction to something. lucy was sitting with jill at the time. they seemed to be doing some sort of quiz. jill was mostly bees- whatever that may mean.

lucy says it will be his hornets.

told her i didn't think donkeys had hornets - but i am wrong.

apparently.

so lucy has given me a sticky thing to apply surreptitiously to rupert at some stage. this will top up his hornet levels and give him a "bit of a boost".

let's hope she's right.

otherwise i might end up with a "bit of a boot".

oh joy!

hair cut

great day!!

kind guy with the beard, the wee feckeyedleeye guy and the why-eye guy decided it was time to give the girls and the alpacas their annual hair cut.

rupert said he knew it was time for the hair cut because the wall had started to rise. asked what he meant and he said it's an old farmers' saying. "when the wall rises the sheeps gets surprises"

said i thought he'd made that up but rupert was having none of it. since rupert's not generally good at rhyming or scanning and since the phrase does both, i can only assume dear reader that he is right.

so the wall must have risen as the sheeps definitely got their surprises. the only one who escaped was lilly, who's too young just now. she decided to have a nap while the others were in the chair.

because rupert knew what was coming we managed to get front row seats. trigger had to stand on top of the trossachs to get a decent view!

anyway it took all day and there was an awful lot of swearing and cursing - and that was just the sheeps! the alpacas forgot they'd had theirs done and went in again for good measure. chris did the same - but we all knew it was only so he'd get double rations of the ginger nuts the bossy woman was doling out. madge and mungo refused point blank to have a hair cut, spat at everyone there and managed to escape - and there was very nearly a nasty accident with scary mary before the wee fekeyedleeye guy remembered where he was putting the trimmers.

it was baking hot and jenny made a killing with the sale of sun screen - which had a familiar smell but i couldn't quite place it. she said it was factory 25 and strong stuff - she was right about that. it absolutley honked. still, if it does the job.

the kind guy with the beard, the wee feckeyedleeyeguy and the why-eye guy can hardly stand now. something to do with a nackered back. or neck. or shoulder.

rupert and i laughed till we cried and then laughed some more.

can't wait for next year!

poker

back on line at last.

have had a dreadful few days what with the screaming barn sheets. they simply would not stop fighting - or screaming. madge told us she thought they were in fact llemons,but they didn't speak the same language as her or mungo. madge rather thought they might be third generation migrators. they certainly were a bit fiery - and they spat even more than madge.

and she has a medical condition.

we all learned to keep our distance of course - specially at meal times.

bossy woman thought she knew best of course and simply would not give in. things came to a bit of a head when one of the new llemons decided to chase her round the paddock. bossy woman was furious. so she ran after the llemons with a bucket of water. in her high heels!

she got absolutely soaked.

did we laugh??!!

so now the new llemons are back inside in the naughty stable. rupert and i felt really sorry for them and went to see them this evening. we took some cardboard specially.

they were playing cards and smoking. don't think they like cardboard. they certainly didn't want to stop and talk. anyway they offered us a game of something called poke her. rupert was quite keen but i reminded him that we had that meeting with the mittee about elfs and safety and couldn't stay.

so what did rupert do? he only went and invited them to tea tomorrow.

oh joy.

screaming barn sheets

whoa!!!

not been able to blog for days - not even been able to start my psycho-psychosist therapy - terriblethings have been happening here. jenny says it's been like the arms of geddon - whoever he may be. even now i'm typing with one eye over my shoulder - which must look rather strange and is definitely giving me a headache.

it's been dreadful!!

first of all these strange creatures appeared.

they looked like llemons - but bigger. they were shouting - and i mean shouting- at each other. jenny said they sounded like screaming barn sheets. now i don't know what a barn sheet is - but if that's the noise they make then i'm obviously better off not knowing.

then today, just as things were calming down another highland thing appeared - well, i say a highland thing - it was tiny so presumably it's a lowland thing. without the horns. or the shaggy coat.

went to see where it had come from - and bumped into nicole. she was sitting behind the shelter with the latest copy of heat magazine. she says it's definitely not hers.

well - this isn'tgood enough. we can't just have things arriving without any prior notice. so i went to see what rupert thought - and he says he's quite philowhatsits about the whole thing.

asked what that meant and he just grinned at me.

rupert is SO clever.

apparently this is what philowhatsits means:

the more animals, the more distractions. the more distractions, the more chances we'll have to get out and raid the bins. the more time raiding the bins, the more cardboard we'll get.

as rupert says - bring it on!!!

impression

so!

at long last someone has noticed i'm not myself.

well - i say someone - i guess a number of the guys have asked what's wrong over the past few days - but when you say "nothing" why do they then assume you mean it??? of course you don't mean it. if they were real friends they'd follow up with further enquiries like "are you sure?" or "how can i help?"

of course i'm not sure.

rupert says he thinks i may have a touch of impression. asked jill what impression was and she says it's the feeling of helplessness you get when you look at something.

i looked at trigger. he was counting the llemons. i lost the will to live.

rupert must be right.

asked rupert how i could get help and at that moment jenny came past. she was dragging a sofa.

"what's wrong?" she asked

"nothing" i replied

"are you sure?" she said - "can i help in any way?"

it turns out that jenny is a qualified psycho-psychosist and has just taken delivery of her professional equipment - which is called a shaz lozenge.

said i thought a lozenge was a throat sweet - but apparently that's a fisherman's pie.

i have maybe misjudged jenny yet again. she is in fact really caring and she says that together we can work through all my issues and come out at the other end of this dark tunnel on a ray of hope.

i signed up on the spot for a course of 5 sessions.

"and how would you like to pay for that?" she said.

raymond

spent the day in the llemons shed. they weren't bothered - they don't use it this time of year - far too busy prancing about like pampered princesses - so i ducked under the cobwebs and spent the day there.

where no one could see me.

got into conversation with someone called raymond who was busy in the corner. he said he was a hearwig. he said he was a good listener and asked why i was hiding from my friends.

i don't normally talk to strangers but for some reason i told him about the lions and the penguins, about jenny's roots, about the vet guy and george, about the fact i was supposed to be performing today, about  being chased by a manic igloo on a regular basis and about how every one takes me for granted.

raymond listened patiently.

he then told me a story about some great king he'd once known who had been beset by problems and had sat down one day in despair, not able to carry on any more - much like myself he said, so i knew he understood how i was feeling - and this king had watched a spider working away and decided that if a spider could keep going against all the odds, so could he.

I suddenly felt i had finally found a friend who understood where i was coming from.

so what did he do? i asked

well, said raymond, first off he killed the spider - couldn't stand the things apparently - then he went into battle and died. served him right too. the spider had done nothing wrong.

great.

a hearwig with a social conscience.

just what i need.

the fringe

what a day!

started badly enough when jenny came to tell us it's a bhw - which is when tgr and all hbl.

that apparently was her prior engagement - while the rest of us were busy sticking together in solidarity against the lions - or penguins - jenny was getting her roots done.

anyway rupert and i went to see caspar to get the poa for tomorrow - we're on at 10 am at the spa and then performing again later with ozzie in one of the very popular igloo chases at tea time - and it was then that we saw the most dreadful thing.

hidden behind the old tractor, at the back of the new shed and away from all the gang was the vet guy with a HUGE needle. it must have been at least 2 feet long and was obviously very very sharp.

i was about to suggest we have a bit of fun - poke the vet guy in the backside or jog the hand with the needle as we walked past - when i had what rupert called a flesh pack - suddenly i was back in that dreadful time when the vet guy nearly killed me. i don't care what rupert says - i nearly died.

and there he was about to do the same thing to george and the guys.

does he never learn???

well i tried to warn george. i told him what had happened to me and tried to force the gate to let him get out. but george wasn't interested. he was busy telling the guys about a time in the handies when his friends, arthur and mikey had played some prank on him and cut his fringe while he was sleeping.

arthur and mikey were highly amused.

asked if his friends mikey and arthur were related in any way to our mikey and arthur.

george said "who?"

and then it was too late. within just a couple of minutes he had had an awful lot more cut off than his fringe.

so that's it.

i've had enough.

i am not taking part in the programme tomorrow.

i am not going to be chased around by some manic igloo.

and i am not sharing my stable with a penguin.

the penguins

still no sign of the lions.

spent another three days behind the big shed with trigger and seamus. jenny stopped coming to join us as she said she had a prior engagement. now i know this is a lie - no one would get engaged to jenny, surely to goodness.

well, i say no one. there must in fact be someone out there for her - somewhere - surely - but i'm still struggling to pair up brenda with the man of her dreams, so what do i know?

anyway, there we were, seamus, trigger and i huddled together, when caspar happened to wander past.

he stopped and asked what we were doing.

told him we were sticking together for when the lions arrived.

"what lions?" - he asked.

"otto and merlin" i said.

"who says they're lions?" he asked.

well - he had me there, i couldn't for the life of me think who had actually said it - we just all knew they were lions. i told him this.

caspar snorted - i think he must have had some hay stuck in his throat.

caspar explained that it was very unlikely that they were lions since the kind guy with the beard didn't strike him as a lion tamer. he didn't wear a top hat, for one thing, and the only time he'd been seen with a chair was when he was struggling to get up high enough to ride caspar himself.

i was beginning to see he might be right, but trigger was having none of it. trigger said he had seen this tv documentary dozens of times -  so that'll be three times then -  and lions definitely go for other animals. even great big animals.

seamus farted again.

caspar sighed.

"right" he said. if they are lions we'll know when a huge cage arrives with a man with a top hat and a chair. "until then" he said "we'll assume they're penguins".

trigger says he's allergic to penguins - and they'll definitely want the stable window left open at night.

oh joy.

 

merlin

whoa!

just when i had got used to being squashed up against the fence behind the new shed with seamus, jenny and trigger, things have taken a turn for the worse.

turns out lucy overheard the kind guy with the beard talking to this woman again and the lions are due here next week. she even heard that one of them is called merlin.

now that sounds like a tricky name if ever there was one.

and - worse still - unless i'm very much mistaken - merlin is another boy's name - so that's 2 male lions.

not even a chance of smooth talking them then.

 

 

 

stick together

no sign of any lions yet.

spent the last three days behind the big shed with trigger, seamus and jenny. it's a tight fit for seamus of course - and jenny come to that - but seamus says if we stick together the lions will be no problem.

rupert says with four of us squeezed into that tiny space there's not much danger of us not sticking together. but what does rupert know? he still thinks we should just try being nice - and hide later if that doesn't work for some reason - but trigger says he knows a thing or two about lions and they're not to be trusted.

so for now i'll stay put.

but i do wish seamus would stop farting.