The Grubtown Daily Herald

Don’t forget to check out the latest news from Philip ‘Beardy’ Ardagh in his blog

FOX FAMILY ‘REALLY VERY ANGRY’ ABOUT BEARDY ARDAGH’S GRUBTOWN TALES
from our angry Grubtown residents correspondent

The Fox family, Grubtown residents and owners of  the local shop KILL ALL DUCKS, have expressed their anger at the way in which author Beardy Ardagh has portrayed them in the first two of his Grubtown Tales. “He’s made us look like duck-hating nutters,” Derek Fox told me, while making a clay model of a duck with its foot caught in a piano. “If he doesn’t show us in a better light in Book 3, we’re going to put a hosepipe through his letter box and fill his house with yoghurt. We’re NICE, I tell you! NICE!” He then threw me out onto his front lawn.

Beardy Ardagh was unavialable for comment. He was too busy taping up his letter box.

The third Grubtown Tale, The Far From Great Escape, is published later this year.

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GRUBTOWN DUCKLINGS SYNCHRONIZED SWIMMING TEAM WINS SECOND PLACE
from our waterfowl formation dancing correspondent

Quackling (top left) breaks formation during all-important cartwheel manoeuvre

Despite bad weather, a polluted pond and the Fox family throwing stale rock buns and shouting, “Ducks aren’t very nice!”, Grubtown’s ducklings synchronized swimming team managed a silver medal at this years’  No-Training-Allowed Because-They’re-Wild-Animals-And-Not-Pets Animal Sports Extravaganza.

This is an animal sports extravaganza in which there’s no training allowed because the contestants are wild animals and not pets.

“Of course we were hoping for first place,” said Grubtown’s mayor, Flabby Gomez. “But second is better than third which is better than fourth which is, without a doubt, better than fifth.”

The competition was neck and neck with the ducklings of nearby Merry Moss, until a Grubtown duckling named Quackling (top left of photo) broke formation in the final cartwheel manoeuvre.

“It is, of course, against the law to bet on the competition,” said former riverboat gambler Carlo Monte and manager of the illegal gambling ship The Crooked Sixpence, “but I did it anyway, and made lots of money.”

Mayor Flabby Gomez went on to point out that it is better to come fifth than sixth and sixth than seventh.

The only reported injury in the three-day event was to a Mrs Awning who got a carrot stuck in her left ear.

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The first of the signs, fixed to the side of Mayor Flabby Gomez's shed home.

THE SIGN OF THE TIMES
from our why do I get to write about boring old road signs correspondent

Following a near miss between a mummy duck and Grubtown sign-painter, Marley Gripe, Chief Grabby Hanson has put up a number of road signs at popular duck crossing points (including that nasty bend in Nasty Bend Road) to warn drivers to steer clear of ducks. “Luckily, Marley Gripe was on his bike,” said Hanson. “”If it had been Mickey ‘Steamroller’ Johnson, on his steamroller, things could have been a lot worse.” (Mr Johnson is currently in Grubtown Jail for flattening Minty Glibb’s cakeshop, and for trying to flatten Minty Glibbs herself.)

“Under normal circumstances, Marley Gipe would have been asked to paint the signs,” Chief Hanson told me, ”but, because he was the one who nearly hit the mummy duck, Mayor Flabby Gomez declared that Mr Gripe should not make any money from the signs put up to try and put a stop to such things. Instead, he had me have the signs made at the nearby GOMEZ SIGNS factory.”

CHIEF SOLVES CRIME BEFORE IT HAPPENS
from our floating gambling den and crime statistics correspondent

Grubtown’s chief of police, Grabby Hanson, has announced some of the best crime-solving figures since crime was invented. “Unlike other police forces,” the chief told reporters on the illegal off-shore gambling ship, The Crooked Sixpence, “here in Grubtown I carry out most of the crimes myself. This means that all I have to do is to arrest myself or to give myself up at the police station, making Grubtown a better and safer place for everyone!”

During the press conference, three reporters had their notebooks stolen, two TV crews ‘lost’ their cameras and TV presenter, Lobby Concourse, was kidnapped. All were found in Grabby Hanson’s locker and were returned in just a few hours. On her TV show, Lobby Concourse said, “I couldn’t have been grabbed by a nicer or more handsome person.”

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GRUBTOWN TO WELCOME BACK NEARBY-VILLAGE IDIOT
from our drooling fool of a correspondent

Being GrubTOWN rather than GrubVILLAGE, Grubtown has never been allowed to have its very own village idiot but, thanks to the generosity of the nearby village of Werty, it will be visited by one this summer. Formal Dripping has won many national and international village idiot awards and, over his long career, has dribbled many gallons of drool. He will be bringing his ever-popular pig’s bladder on a stick, and promises to point at everything (and nothing in particular) guffawing loudly and stupidly for no apparent reason.

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FOX FAMILY ACTUALLY SELLS SOMETHING IN SHOP
from our absolutely stunned correspondent

Ever since its opening a few years ago, KILL ALL DUCK (a shop which sells nothing but badly made models of ducks involved in fatal accidents) has not had ANY customer except for the shop-owners themselves. The Fox family opened their shop when Mrs Bunty Fox claimed that she failed her driving test when a passing duck put her off with its QUACKING. She drove the car into the sea.

Husband Derek Fox told our reporter that they’d actually sold a model of a duck being struck by lightning, made by their daughter Garrideb. “We were amazed and delighted,” he told The Grubtown Daily Herald.

KILL ALL DUCKS’s first and only customer was later found trying to boil his own foot in a saucepan of nettle soup and is currently in the care of Dr Fraud.

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MAYOR FLABBY GOMEZ NEEDS YOUR WOOL!
from our doing-what-the-mayor-tells-me-to-do correspondent

Work is well underway on the knitting of  new home for the mayor and his family. Mayor Gomez is doing all the knitting himself, but needs all the wool he can get his hands on. If you have any unwanted balls of wool, or are willing to unravel any old socks and sweaters, please leave them in any of the official ‘wool drop bins’ located around Grubtown. While work on his new home is underway, Flabby Gomez, wife Pritt Gomez and son Tundra Gomez continue to live in a garden shed.

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JILLY CHEETER GRUBTOWN’S OFFICIAL DUCK GATHERER
from our wildfowl and recently employed correspondent

Young Jilly Cheeter has been awarded the important job of being the town’s new duck gatherer. The job comes with a duck-call whistle and a big key to The Duck House. “I didn’t apply for the job,” Jill Cheeter explained. “I was sent to the council offices to complain that we don’t have a cane toad living in our compost heap though our nextdoor neighbour does, and went through the wrong door.”

Before she quite knew what had happened, Grubtown’s official council job-giver-outer, Rambo Sanskrit, had made her duck-gatherer. “It’s lucky that I love ducks!” she said.

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MANGO CLAPTRAPS SHORTS FRIGHTEN DRAGONFLY
from our out-of-fashion correspondent

Young Mango Claptrap is a very familar sight around Grubtown with his very short shorts. There is much debate about whether he has lots of  look-so-alike-you-can’t tell-them-apart short shorts, or whether he just wears the same pair all the time. Eitherway, Grubtowners everywhere can spot Mango Claptrap (and his short shorts) from a long way off. “I’m happy for the citizens of Grubtown to wear whatever they like,” Mayor Flabby Gomez announced at a recent town meeting, “but I’ve heard reports that young Claptrap’s short shorts have been upsetting some of the local insects, so I will be keeping an eye on the matter.” The mayor strongly denied rumours that he might be introducing a ‘clothes tax’.

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Ill? Dying Or Just Plain Old badly Injured?
Then call DR FRAUD on Grubtown 882.
“I may not be a real doctor, but I’m cheap and have my own stethascope.
No bils too big, no cuts too small.

Looking for a clean shirt or a wedding ring?
Then why not vist SCORN’S LAUNDRETTE & JEWELLERS on Wrong Street?
Lefty Scorn has years of experience unblocking dryers,
filling the washing-powder-dispensing machine
and slling fine jewellery, most of it genuine.
“SCORN’S. We put the sparkle in your laundry and on your fingers.”

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KEEP UP WITH ALL THE LATEST GRUBTOWN NEWS BY READING ‘GRUBTOWN TALES’
Children’s books just got a whole lot siller!

An extremely exciting and exceptionally silly new series from the creator of Eddie Dickens. Grubtown is certainly a town and certainly grubby - except for the squeaky clean parts - but everything else we know about the place comes from Beardy Ardagh, town resident and author of these tales …

Grubtown is full of oddballs - from the singing Grumbly girls to a family of duck-haters, and an out-sized mayor who’s knitting a new house - but Manual Org is too repulsive even for them. Getting him to leave town is top priority, until the discovery of a humongous diamond changes everything …

A startled cow falling out of nowhere onto Limbo Goulash while he’s riding Marley Gripe’s bicycle marks the start of a chain of events strange even by Grubtown’s standards. With Mayor Flabby Gomez throwing a wobbly, all chief of police, Grabby Hanson, can do is have the cow-fearing townsfolk watch the skies. Underground, meanwhile, there lies another big surprise …

Chief of Police, Grabby Hanson