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

wild goose chase

ha ha!

great day!!

kind guy with the beard was away so bossy woman decided she'd take over and get us all inside for the night.

no chance!

there we were all waiting at the field gate and rupert said - right let's have some fun. rupert has been so depressed lately that it was great to see him back to normal and we all decided to do him proud.

tim and caspar swapped stables at the last minute. rupert and i split up and went in different stables and then shouted because we'd got split up. jill and lucy stayed in the field and the bossy woman had to traipse across the field in the dark to get them. best moment was when she got stuck in the mud again.

jenny went in the llemon's stable. the llemons went in the guinea pigs' shed. bruce was furious. he kept shouting at them to get out but madge coudn't hear at that pitch. she kept spitting back just in case bruce was being rude.

ozzie went in the big shed with the girls. seamus left the field, came into the yard and crept up behind the bossy woman when she wasn't looking. he then grunted and when she dropped her bucket of feed he made off with it. we didn't know he could move so fast!

chris went to steal the llemon's feed. ozzie stole the ducks feed. madge and mabel tried to steal a motorbike. they couldn't hot wire it though and gave up.

and scary mary and charlie climbed on top of the feed sacks in the workshop and helped themselves.

trigger forgot where he normally went and when - and ended up in the right stable at the right time. he was absolutley amazed - that was the first time that had ever happened.

and rupert?

rupert laughed so much that i cried with joy to have him back again.

a great, great day!!!

headache

told rupert not to worry any more - i would sort things out. i said i was perfectly capable of doing the sort of things that rupert does.

left rupert in the stable. not sure why he had his head in his hands. maybe he had a headache.

went looking for a "post" but wasn't sure what i was looking for. jenny saw me looking and asked if she could help. i couldn't think of anyone less likely to be a help - but equally there wasn't anyone else offering and rupert says jenny's "been around a bit" - so i thought she might know what a "post" was.

i was right!

she took me straight to one lying on the ground behind the old tractor.

it is a long wooden thing and i couldn't for the life of me see how this would help rupert and me. i asked her how you used it.

she hit me on the head.

twice.

it really hurt!

told her to stop.

she stopped - thankfully.

right, i said, now you've calmed down, how do you use it?

she hit me again.

jenny is every bit as bad as rupert says!! decided i probably wouldn't ask the question again - and anyway i didn't want to know how it worked if it was going to hurt that much. walked off to find some cardboard.

then i had a brainwave.

i wonder if jenny's post would work on the igloos???

 

 

post

right.

even the bossy woman's spotted that rupert's in a bad mood so i know things must be bad! i heard her suggest he try some of her H R Tea patches.

this is a very silly idea.

rupert doesn't even like tea. he's a warm milk sort of guy - with gingernuts of course.

when i told rupert he was furious and bit me. so i said he should tell me what's actually wrong and we'd see what we could do to put it right.

well, i didn't actually say that - but it was more or less what i meant.

eventually he gave in.

turns out rupert just can't cope with the igloos. he says there's so much pressure on him to get things sorted that he doesn't know what to do next. he said he'd never come across something that was so unwilling to learn.

felt really sorry for rupert. he's always the clever one who knows what to do. we all look to him for common sense and decisions and explanations - and we've obviously gone too far this time.

said i'd go behind alpaca mountain and do some thinking.

went behind alpaca mountain but couldn't think of anything other than gingernuts.

and igloos.

then i had a brainwave.

 

i was reading about sheep once and how stubborn they can be and this farmer was explaining what he did when one of his sheep refused to do something. he had a special tool he used called a "post". not sure what he did with it but if we can get our hands on a post we'll maybe crack it.

told rupert and he says it's a great idea.

now all we need is a post.

 

brothers

went to the meeting of the brothers yesterday. was amazed to see that tim was there - since when was he a brother?? - he's only been around a few months.

then lucy and jenny walked in.  i'm obviously missing somethign here. jenny was munching on something of course - i would guess it's igloo feed. certainly one of the igloos was peering over the wall at her. she didn't offer us any.

grumpy guts rupert was there too.

the meeting started well enough, with all of us in the same boat - fairly pissed off at having to put up with all this interruption - to our routine AND to our treats - but things got difficult when caspar asked if we'd made any progress with the igloos.

we haven't and i really didn't want to go there again.

for goodness sake - we're not getting enough sleep or enough treats - we simply don't have the strength to go out in this foul weather to try to teach manners to some prehistoric old bird with a huge beak and a red wig - so i changed the subject before rupert could bite his head off.

caspar's that is.

even rupert in this mood wouldn't tackle an igloo on the run.

i hope . . .

 

on strike

right.

that's it.

apparently we're all on strike.

rupert says first we get crammed into the little stable. then we have to sit by and look the other way as the funny sucking noises come out of next door.

then we have to watch as nicole gets apples and gingernuts and anything else she wants - EVEN THOUGH SHE STILL SAYS IT ISN'T HER BABY!!!!

then to cap it all we get shut in JUST BECAUSE IT'S RAINING.rupert says what do they think we are? big girls' blouses??

i nearly said i had a big girls' blouse and i called it my posh smock - but decided not to mention it. rupert was really mad. he was ok until the vet guy appeared but completely lost it after that. he was even annoyed that nicole had an injection. an injection! that really hurts!!!

things have got very serious.

rupert's summoned what he calls a "meeting of the brothers" tomorrow. so that'll be rupert my real brother and trigger my twin brother and me presumably. asked why the others weren't coming and apparently i'vegot it wrong. again. "brothers" refers to something completely different.

glad we've cleared that up then.

trigger says rupert needs to take a chill pill. can't think why - it's freezing in that stable. even the wee shouty thing has a coat on.

and what do i think?

i want to know what a strike is and does it keep you warm??

 

wee shouty thing

dreadful night!

for some reason best known to the kind guy with the beard, our little stable has been commandeered for the wee shouty thing that appeared yesterday. so caspar, jill, rupert and i are all crammed into the one stable.

rupert says it's disgrace. he's going to talk to charlie about it. just as soon as charlie's forgiven us for shopping nicole.

that'll be some time never then.

it's not so much the lack of space - trigger's not in there so we can at least breathe - it's the noise. every couple of hours it starts shouting. then nicole starts banging on the stable door to get away from it. then the kind guy with the beard comes in. then there's a funny sucking sound. then it goes quiet again.

every couple of hours.

day and night.

rupert says at least it's got us off igloo watch - we're far too tired for that and caspar's given us a few days off - but that's not much consolation at 2am.

note to self - ask caspar what's going on in there - he's the only one who can see over the stable door.

another tivity

Whoa!!

What a day!

woke to find we had our very own tivity in the shed. there in middle of the floor was a skinny wrinkly slobbery little thing making a terrific noise. caspar said it was a lamb. trigger got out his carpentry tools and george and the guys went straight into characterer and and we all gazed dutifully on - until rupert pointed out that we didn't have a mary.

lucy said jenny was away powdering her nose. i know for a fact that this was a lie. she disappears every morning to grab the igloos' feed and give them a good kicking.

but rupert said - no - a real mary. we had a real baby so there must be a real mary somewhere.

looked everywhere but there was no mary to be seen.

jill said if it was a lamb then the real mary must be one of the girls. went and asked charlie if one of the girls had had a baby lamb but he said he was not able to divulge information of a confidential nature unless we had the appropriate paperwork. in triplicate. and officialy stamped.

then we spotted nicole. we went to ask if she knew anything and before we could utter a single word she said "it's not mine" and went back to reading her heat magazine.

well, the kind guy with the beard was having none of it. he dragged her off to the stable and left her with the wrinkly thing. she was really mad and charlie says he's going to get the unions involved. he says it's an infringement of our animal rights.

the wrinkly thing is very small and very noisy. it is also very stupid. the kind guy with the beard even had to show it how to eat and poured four lots of warm milk into it.  i know because i was counting. i was actually keeping an eye out for gingernuts..

rupert's come up with a great idea. if we pretend we've forgotten how to eat maybe we'll get extra rations. not sure i want milk, but the idea's sound enough!

 

birthday!!!!

it's my birthday!!!

got bucketloads of gingernuts from the gang, another a-roaming therapy voucher from lucy to replace the one seamus ate and a new string for my bow tie from jill.

no-one got trigger anything so i gave him four packets of gingernuts. he was so pleased. he's told everyone i've given him more gingernuts than he can count.

day was ruined though as caspar told us we had to get on with this mac and mable thing - EVEN THOUGH IT WAS MY BIRTHDAY. this is beyond a joke. we're supposed to teach some manners to a pair of jail birds (ha ha) who are on the run, using false names, have some sort of dodgy arrangement with a kestrel and won't stand still long enough to listen to what we have to say.

rupert decided enough was enough.  rupert says you learn more when you're not trying - apparently things can seep into your brain without you realising. it's called sub lemon and lime cog science.

i said things are always seeping into my brain when i'm not looking - it's called a hole in the stable roof.

anyway apparently we can use this cog science to our advantage.

got everything set up and went in search of the igloos.   discovered mac - or brenda - lurking behind the spa - in disguise!!!!

things are obviously far worse than we thought. on top of everything else, the igloos have absolutely no sense of style.

red hair on an igloo?

i don't think so!

twins

back again at last!!

and where have we been this time? yet another problem with this wall of fire. it's amazing no-one's been hurt! have had a word with charlie and he'll talk to the elf of safety to see what we can do.

in the meantime it's my birthday tomorrow!!!

i'd forgotten - but my friend gill came to see me (another gill with red hair but not poorly feet - or so she says) and she reminded me. she's brought me bucket loads of gingernuts. trigger says it's his birthday too. rupert says if that's true then trigger and I must be twins. don't fancy being a twin with trigger as he farts in his sleep and can't count - but who am i to argue with the forces of nature?

anyway gill says i can't have my gingernuts until tomorrow. gill is wrong. i saw her put them in the wooden shed and i can have them whenever i want.

so back to business. caspar had asked us to give the igloos another chance so we did. but first we spoke to ozzie. ozzie has little to do with mac and mable and we wanted to know why. at first ozzie didn't want to say, but eventually he caved in as rupert had a borbon biscuit behind his ear and we all know ozzie'll do anything for a borbon.

turns out mac and mable aren't mac and mable at all - their real names are brenda and sheila and they're on the run from the igloo police. asked why they were pretending to be something they're not and ozzie said something i didn't catch about pots and kestrels.

rupert says kestrels are stroppy birds with big beaks - so i guess they'd have a fair bit in common with igloos. not sure where the pots come in.

anyway we've reported back to caspar and he says we have to get to the bottom of this. by "we" of course he means rupert and me - kwell surprise as rupert says!

one more chance

terrible weather. gale force winds and rain and the kind guy with the beard decided we should stay in again. we took the time to regroup in the big stable to consider our next move with mac and mable.or at least rupert and the guys did. i found some old cardboard and considered that instead.

tim says we have to have another go. he says if at first you don't succeed, try try again. tim of course is not the one on the receiving end of the beak. madge told us she'd once read a self help book that said if at first you don't succeed at least make sure you destroy the evidence. i pointed out that mac and mable were systematically destroying my book. hope caspar didn't hear.

caspar asked us to give his method one more chance. he has suggested we speak first wih ozzie to see if perhaps there is a language barrier. caspar says there is no reason for anyone in pets corner to behave like this and perhaps mac and mable simpy don't understand our customs.

george said he'd been through customs once on his way from the handies. he said it was a dreadful time and he never wanted to repeat it. he said they treated you like animals and if that's what was wrong with mac and mable then he was with the igloos.

we all looked at george for an explanation.

he said nothing more.

caspar has suggested we wait for this storm to pass - thankfully. the idea of being cold, wet AND pecked at didn't really appeal.

went back to my cardboard just as trigger suggested we should play count the bricks.

oh joy!