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Breakdown

January 17, 2013 //
5

skeleton

Mouse finally had her break down everybody was waiting for. Yesterday, one could hardly talk to her without her bursting into tears. She is obviously overworked. But asking her what the matter was made it even worse. I have learned my lesson in the meantime and leave her alone on days like this, it will pass! I will approach her again when she has calmed down.  Even though I know this is not the best thing to do, on days like this you basically can’t win. Talk to her, she cries. Don’t talk to her she says, nobody loves her. Thankfully she doesn’t have these days very often.

Last night she went to visit her bosom buddy Skeleton Edeltraut, who lives with her partner Monster under my bed. Wednesday night  is Monster’s night out. He meets up with some monster mates at the local for quiz night and a beer. Skeleton Edeltraut doesn’t like to go to the pub and hang out with Monster‘s mates, but doesn’t want to be at home on her own either because she has a stalker. Puppy Lou is in love with her, ever since he first laid eyes on her. I can understand the attraction for a young dog. She on the other hand is just plain scared of his attention, which of course I can understand as well. Have you ever seen how a dog treats a bone?

Personally, I am okay with my skeletons (the rest of her family lives in my closet), as long as they don’t bother me. But I wouldn’t seek them out and that goes for Monster as well. But Mouse is a regular visitor at their place. Last night they must have had a good heart to heart. They kept their voices down, but between sobbing I could hear fragments like “… just too much…” “…everybody relies…” “… take it anymore….” I didn’t try too hard to listen in on their conversation. I know it will blow over and she will be back to her normal self. I hope it will be today!

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Categories Art, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life, Relationships, Social Network

Topsy-Turvy

January 16, 2013 //
4

fc and mouse

It’s all happening at the moment. First of all, the problem we had with the blog images seems to have dissolved into thin air. Yesterday morning, Mouse was close to a nervous break-down after she had spent almost the whole night on the computer trying to solve the problem together with Foreign Correspondent. You know how it is. When there is a technical issue, you really want to nail it, don’t you! When the posted image still didn’t show up in the Reader yesterday, she was hyperventilating. I was worried she might have a heart attack. Finally, she threw her hands in air and admitted defeat.

However, by lunch time she checked the blogs she is following in the Reader and she couldn’t believe her eyes. There they were, the Dede blog images. All of them. The two from yesterday, the day before, even last weeks. So, remind me again, what was the problem? It seems to have been a WordPress glitch and Mouse and Foreign Correspondent now believe it might have something to do with the size of the original images. The images I give them to put up are sized to fit into the width of our blog column, not  a single pixel larger, and WordPress obviously makes them even smaller to display in the Reader.

They told everybody what they had figured out, but the Dedes weren’t interested in the detail. They were just pleased that it finally seems to work.

This gave Foreign Correspondent the confidence to put up his introductory post on the German Blog dedepuppetsde.wordpress.com. So it is all go now. “And we even have a follower already!” He was really chuffed when he reported back to us. “We also had a comment from Monika-Maria, congratulating me on my new job and what a great idea it is to have the German translation.” He could barely hide his pride.

Mouse was a bit touchy. “So what?” she said. “You are only rehashing what we do on our English blog. And if I hadn’t done all the hard work here for nearly a year, nobody would have looked at yours today.”  She tried to down-play his success. I was genuinely surprised by her reaction. I thought these two were getting on well, after their unexpected bonding exercise of trouble-shooting. Then it occurred to me there might be professional envy at play.

Mouse thrives on the admiration for her work and so far there has been absolutely no one who could hold a candle up to her. Then out of the blue Foreign Correspondent shows up and in next to nothing he gets something off the ground, no fussing at all. Uh, that must have hurt.

“And by the way,” Mouse continued with the snappy tone, “I have started on the Dede puppets fan page on facebook… We have been discussing it for so long. This is just ridiculous. I can’t wait until we all agree… I could wait until the cows come home!”

“So how is it going with this one?” Socialite pricked up her ears. She was always keen on a facebook page. “Not so well,” Mouse admitted quietly. “I shouldn’t have said anything yet. I have to get my head around this first. After all, I was very tired last night from all the trouble shooting the night before. So, please don’t look at it yet!”

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Categories Art, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life, Relationships, Social Network

A little trouble shooting

January 15, 2013 //
4

mouse fixing

I asked all the Dedes individually what they thought of Foreign Correspondent’s performance and whether we should go ahead with his proposal. Most of them couldn’t care less as long as it didn’t increase their workload. The one who really had to think hard about it was Mouse, as she does all the work around here. When she realised there was something going on, she watched Foreign Correspondent closely, but couldn’t fault him. He is a professional. Over the weekend he translated all the background information and recreated the blog in German, so he could start as soon as the Dede Committee gave him the green light.

Foreign Correspondent had also been watching Mouse and last night he approached her. “Do you think we could fix the problem with the images?” he asked “I don’t want to start posting when this problem isn’t solved.”

Mouse was taken aback at first. She felt he was making demands, despite him being the newbie. In her opinion newbies have to keep their mouth’s shut, just watch and slip into place once they had observed enough and found their own little niche. They are not supposed to make suggestions, not on the first day at least… Unfortunately, Mouse herself knew something wasn’t working correctly, but she pretended she didn’t know. “What’s wrong?” she asked with a surprised tone in her voice and a tad defensive.

“When I first look at a new post, the pics are crunched up in tiny little boxes” Foreign Correspondent described the problem. “I have to double click first to see them in full size and they don’t show up in the Reader either.”

Mouse admitted that she has had the same problem, but initially thought it was just a little glitch with her computer. She thought she had fixed it when she double clicked on it and the visitors wouldn’t have a problem. Indeed, she had asked some people and they were totally unaware of the problem she was talking about, while others said they had also experienced it.

“It all worked a breeze before, until the WordPress people made changes to the library module” Mouse explained. “I don’t know what I can do about it. I’ve tried virtually everything!”

“I’ve noticed” Foreign Correspondent answered. “Now I can’t even double click anymore.”

“I am at the end of my tether. I even sent a support question to WordPress, but have had no response yet. It might have something to do with the template I am using, maybe I have to change this.”

Foreign Correspondent suggested I should give him a lift to my office, while Mouse stayed at home and made changes. Then he could use the computer at work to check whether it worked or not.

When I went to bed last night, Mouse and Foreign Correspondent were busy skyping and changing things, but without the usual screaming and cursing. I don’t know if they have fixed the problem or not.

We will see when this post goes up.

It would be great if readers who have had this problem could let Mouse and Foreign Correspondent know if it has been fixed. Or if not, does anybody have an idea what’s going on? Your help is very much appreciated!

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Categories Art, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life, Relationships, Social Network

Foreign Correspondent

January 13, 2013 //
7

foreign correspondant

Today is Sunday again and the Dedes are all curious about what the second installment from Miss Viwi on ||:::VEGGIETORIA:::|| will be like. I am pretty sure they will be hanging around the living room tonight again so they don’t miss the new post.

Miss Viwi’s series got the Dedes thinking. We got a few comments lately from German speaking readers and friends who said they use the Dedes to brush up on their English, but sometimes they are not sure about the meaning as the blog is quite colloquial. During the week this fellow introduced himself to me. He claimed to be a foreign correspondent. I didn’t believe him at first, he looks more like a tourist to me, but then he put forward his ideas and I changed my mind. He seems to know what he is talking about.

Here is what he suggested: He is going to scan all the posts on the dedepuppet blog and will write a summary twice a week in German. These summaries will be posted on dedepuppetsde.wordpress.com, not on this blog here. There will be no new stories on the German blog at all, as all the Dedes are in New Zealand, so new stories can only happen here and they will continue to happen in English. Of course Foreign Correspondent will report back to us if any interesting comments are made.

I haven’t put it to the Dede committee yet to find out what they think, but Foreign Correspondent was proactive and translated the site anyway. He says he wants to be ready to roll as soon as he gets the go ahead. I said he should hold his horses as we will put him to the test when Miss Viwi’s post needs to be translated again. So tonight he will be presenting his proposal and translation to the Dedes.

What do you think?

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Categories Art, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life, Relationships, Social Network

Hello neighbours

January 12, 2013 //
6

the neigbours

The weather here is just fantastic at the moment. During the day it is hot, but still bearable, and when night falls, it becomes balmy. This is the time when it is lovely to sit outside for a little, before the mosquitoes start their battle for dominance  outdoors. Last night a few of us where sitting on the deck, having a quiet wind-down from a busy week, when Nosy Neighbour and his wife Two-faced walked by. They only got married last year and we don’t see much of them. We see him more than her, though. We really only know her as a shadow behind the curtain in their living room. He, on the other hand, is out and about. He does some gardening or fetches the newspaper and I even think he does the shopping for the two of them. He particularly likes to be out after the Dedes have had a loud party. Sometimes I suspect he is only hanging around in the open in order to catch me and have a good old rant about my lot.

“Hello neighbours,” I called out when I saw them passing “Want to join us?”

They looked at each other and Two-faced shook her head. “Would love to catch up” Nosy Neighbour replied, “but we have to keep going. We have to do something about the kilos we gained over Christmas.” Nevertheless, he approached the deck a little, but Two-faced was anchored firmly to the footpath and didn’t move an inch.

“Lovely evening for it” Devil said to keep the small-talk going.

“I’ve just started to read your blog” Nosy Neighbour told us, when he finally stopped a few paces from where we were sitting.

“What do you think?” Mouse wanted to know of course.

“Interesting read” he said and looked at me. “I don’t even know why you bother. They are such a nuisance.” He pointed with his head towards my little friends, and continued talking as if they weren’t there. “Why don’t you kick them all out and that is it. No more problems! Myself? I wouldn’t put up with their crap!”

All the Dedes that were with me started laughing. They thought it was a big big joke. Only I knew he was serious. I had too many similar conversations with him before.

“They are not that bad” I appeased him. He rolled his eyes, turned around and mumbled: “You really have to mow your lawn too” while he walked back to his wife, who was still waiting on the foot path. She waived at us with a smile, before they walked on.

“He has such dead pan humour, I just love it!” Devil said.

“We should invite them to our next barbeque,” Mouse added. “It’s a pity we know so little about them, they are Dedes just like us, aren’t they?”

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Categories Art, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life, Relationships, Social Network

But what about us monkeys?

January 11, 2013 //
2

monkey lamp

Yes, I was happy with Philosopher’s statement about what the Dede’s mission is. They are celebrating diversity! I was really happy for a day, until Monkey showed up.

Monkey swung through the curtains to the floor lamp and stopped a safe distance from me. I observed him closely. He is a bit stand-offish and usually only comes to see me in a group with others. Even today he looked as if he had to muster all his bravery. He sat there and casually scratched some flees out of his fur. Finally he addressed me: “Diversity you said… ”

“Yes”, I answered proudly “That’s what the Dedes are about”

“What is that supposed to mean?”

“You could also say ‘Live and let live!’ Embracing all the differences” I said.

“Funny you should say that” said Monkey, still sitting at a safe distance.  “So what about the monkeys then?”

“What about them?” I asked as I had no clue what he was on about.

“Aren’t you writing a book!” Monkey said.

“No, not at the moment, though I have written plenty of books in the past. Now I am too busy with the Dedes”

“So it’s not true that you have a nearly completed book in the drawer… The others told me so.”

And then all of a sudden it occurred to me,  yes, right. Last summer before the Dedes burst onto the scene I was indeed working on a book that contained all my wisdom of over sixteen years of teaching digital imaging. I had made good progress until the rain set in and the Dedes pushed into my life.

“Ah, you mean ‘Let’s kill that monkey‘?” I blurted out. Oops, only now I noticed what an unfortunate title it had.

Monkey jumped a bit further away from me and said: “Yes that one”.

I laughed out loud. “No worries… I don’t really kill monkeys. Did you really think I would?”

He wanted to know why I gave my book such a mean title. It is a clear call to violence after all. I explained it was frustration talking. I had the strong feeling some of my students didn’t really want to be bothered with understanding the programs, but chose just to fluff around and see what comes out. I wouldn’t call my student monkeys, no way, but any work created without intention I call ‘monkey work’.

“This doesn’t sound like celebrating differences. In fact it is very derogatory. You have to come up with a different term!” said Monkey while swinging away.

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Categories Art, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life, Relationships, Social Network

Philosopher’s thought

January 10, 2013 //
10

philosopher walk

On Wednesday mornings Philosopher comes round and picks me up for a walk. I treasure this hour with him. There is no need to talk, if there is nothing to talk about. Sometimes silence in company can feel awkward, you certainly know that feeling, but with Philosopher quietness feels comforting. He has a very good head on his shoulders. And if you talk, you can be sure he would never pooh pooh any ideas – even if they are miles off the beaten track – nor would he speak badly about anyone.

So we walked in silence for a while and then I had to ask him: “So, Philosopher, what do you think about Witch’s comment on the blog yesterday?”

“Sorry, I don’t read your blog,” he answered honestly. “What happened?”

“You don’t read my blog?” I asked in disbelief.

“A lot of your friends don’t. Everybody knows you will tell them what’s happening anyway next time you see them.”

“Do they really?”  I tried to remember the barbeques I had been to lately and started to wonder if everybody is getting sick of me. Am I  quietly turning into a bore? I have to admit, Philosopher is right, the Dedes are my favourite subject.

“Oh, yes,” Philosopher smiled benevolently. “But don’t worry, they all like your passion – and not just that, they love us Dedes.” Before I could think more about my real friends, Philosopher got me back on my original train of thought: “So what did Witch say?”

I told him that Witch was taken aback by my remark the Dedes are for fun. It was just an aside and I wished Witch wouldn’t read my blog and wouldn’t pick up on little throw-away phrases like that.

“Do you think we are for fun?” Philosopher inquired.

“Not always… but what do you think, Philosopher, what is the agenda of the Dedes? Help me out here, please.” I know for a fact Witch would love to have more space on the blog to promote a frugal and healthy lifestyle. Cash Cow might support her, but it would displease most of the other Dedes, as this is really just Witch’s hobby-horse.

Philosopher didn’t think long: “In my opinion, the Dedes are celebrating diversity and they are having fun while doing it. This, my valued friend, is a good enough reason for their existence!”

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Categories Art, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life, Relationships, Social Network

My word!

January 9, 2013 //
3

cash cow witch tea

Cash Cow and Witch popped in for a cup of tea. They seem to have become good friends over the last couple of months and hang out together a lot. As soon as they had their mugs in front of them Witch started to raise her concerns about my post yesterday, where I wrote about Pirate‘s business preposition.

“You know, I am not happy with what you’ve said” she started. And Cash Cow nodded eagerly in support.

I was very surprised about this comment, as I know Witch is not into money.  At least she never tires of telling the rest of us that… Though be careful when you ask her to look into her crystal ball for you; she charges an arm and a leg for that service. It is her only source of income and of course being self-employed she never knows when the next payment will come in. (I have no idea how many people use her services.) So over time she adopted an extremely frugal life style, living off the land. I admire her for being able to make a meal out of virtually nothing. She is also very generous and happy to share her concoctions with others – unfortunately most of the other Dedes are not too keen to take up the offer.  So she is a bit of a loner and just does her own thing. It can’t be good for anybody, and I was pleased when Cash Cow took a liking to her. It seems to work both ways and I assume Witch has taken Cash Cow under her wing, sort of as an apprentice. We all know Cash Cow is strapped for money, and she certainly can learn a thing or two from Witch about how to make a bob stretch further. I hope she doesn’t teach her how to read the crystal ball though. I can not imagine a cow doing a good job in this profession.

“So you would have taken up Pirate’s offer then?” I replied flabbergasted.

“Of course not,” Witch looked at me sternly. “What is it with you people, why is it always about money?!”

“Aren’t you just talking about my missed business opportunity?”

“No, no, I agree with you on this one. I wouldn’t trust Pirate as far as I could throw him.” Witch shook her head fiercely.

“What else did I say then?” I tried to recall the conversation with Pirate, but all I could remember was him trying to sell me his latest scheme. In fact I couldn’t remember saying much at all.

“You said we are here to have fun!” Cash Cow blurted out.

“Do you really think we are that shallow? We only want to have fun?” Witch asked. It certainly didn’t feel like fun right then, it felt more like the inquisition.

“Forgive me,” I begged “it was just a thoughtless comment. It didn’t mean anything.”

“You have to be a bit more careful with your comments, my dear, you certainly devalued us Dedes with that one!”

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Categories Art, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life, Relationships, Social Network

Pirate’s proposition

January 8, 2013 //
9

pirates deal

Last night we had a storm. Nothing unusual really in our neck of the woods. However, this time the storm blew Pirate back home. I haven’t seen him for ages. I think last time was when he wanted to sell me his dad’s old vinyl records, because he thought I still had a record player to listen to them.

Pirate is rather an odd one. He calls himself an entrepreneur. I am not sure, but I think in the old days you would have called someone like him a wheeler and dealer. Nobody really knows what he does for a living. Sometimes he has pockets full of money, other times he has to conveniently leave for an important meeting before the bill can be settled.

He has tried his hand at everything… pyramid schemes, that truly weren’t pyramid schemes (his words, not mine), fixing computer viruses via phone and selling grandmothers…. But if you know all this, and can withstand the pressure to buy, he is actually a really lovely Dede.

So last night he came round to my house and asked if he could stay for dinner. ‘Oh!’, I thought to myself,  ‘watch out, he is poor at the moment’. I am not too keen on his company when he is poor. Not because of the fact that he has no money. No, no, I don’t like him for the hair-raising schemes he devises when he is desperate. But then, he is always happy to take us out to posh restaurants when he is rich, so how could I not share our simple meal with him?

“So, I hear the Dedes are doing well” he said, while he was watching me cooking dinner. “They even had something written about them in Austria!”

“Yes,” I confirmed, but didn’t want to say more.

“Are you making money yet?” he came straight to the point.

“What kind of question is that?” I asked. “We are not in it for the money – We are having fun!”

“Bullshit” he said. “Don’t give me that airy fairy crap…”

“And you watch your language” I interrupted.

“I am a pirate for god’s sake,” he reminded me of the obvious. How could I forget looking at his hideous mustache.

He came back to his proposition: “You know, you are sitting on a gold mine. Just let me be your manager. I will organise everything for you.” He pushed a piece of paper over the breakfast bar in my direction. I glanced at the heading: ‘Manager’s Contract’. “We could do T-shirts and printed coffee mugs and, oh, the mind boggles…” His eyes glazed over.

“Dream on….” I said to him, while I fished spaghetti out of the pot. “We have to sell the Hermit’s Web books first!” I didn’t have the heart to tell him outright that he would be the last Dede I would entrust with my affairs.

“But…” he started again. I stopped what I was doing and stared deep into his one good eye.

“Just asking…” he said a bit huffy, but I knew he’d got the message.

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Categories Art, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life, Relationships, Social Network

In the dog box again

January 6, 2013 //
8

devil telling me off

As ArtistatExit0 commented yesterday, Pig and Witch might not tell me their story because they still have mutual respect for each other. So I decided to let the sleeping dogs lie – for now at least. I know myself, sometime in the future, when I tidy up, I will come across this picture again and my curiosity will get the better of me once more. One day I will find out….

Anyway, I was just sitting here writing my blog, when Mouse came running through the door.  At 8:15 in the morning! I was more than surprised… I know very well that Mouse (our little gossip) has a very busy schedule on Sundays. It is a set routine for her. Every Sunday the same… She starts her day with an early morning breakfast with Devil, then goes on to have a mid-morning snack with Pirate, lunch with whoever has a story to tell. Then she moves on to have coffee and cake with Deutsch Fraulein (German girl) and dinner at Witch‘s place in the company of Cat. She finishes her day with a night cap at Professor and Pig‘s place if there is no party to go to. You will certainly agree that is a lot to get through in one day.

Today she must have had a very short breakfast with Devil. I was just about to ask her what happened when I realised she was fuming. “So when were you going to tell us?” she squeaked at me.

“What?” I said, totally unaware about what I had done now.

“You traitor, you went to ||:::VEGGIETORIA:::|| all by yourself and none of us knew.” I noticed Devil appeared in the door now as well. Mouse had run so fast that she left him in the dust.

“This is not quite correct!” I replied: “L’Artiste was with me.”

“L’artiste doesn’t know anything about public relations, you should have consulted with the rest of us.” Mouse made such a roar that more and more Dedes woke up and made their way to the kitchen, where I was sitting writing my blog.

“What’s going on?” asked Ducky, the politician. “Tell them,” Mouse said, hands on hips.

So I told them the story.

Before Christmas, Miss Viwi, an Austrian blogger invited L’Artiste  and myself to visit her site ||:::VEGGIETORIA:::|| for an interview. Miss Viwi is concerned about contemporary nutrition and animal welfare and is also very interested in art.  She has fallen in love with the Dedes and wanted to profile them on her blog for German speakers. The series about the Dede puppets will start today with the first installment.

“It didn’t occur to you to talk to us about what to say in the interview?” Devil asked.

“Honestly, they were mostly art questions. After the incident with Buchalov, I thought you guys were not particularly interested in art. And anyway, I think L’Artiste and I did a reasonably good job” I defended myself.

“Give us an example” Mouse demanded.

“Ah, there were so many questions… Let me think, one was how I had….”

“Admit it, it wasn’t really about us, it was about you!” Devil said. “Didn’t you say in your New Year’s resolution that this year it will be all about the Dedes and not about you…. Here we go, we are not even one week into the New Year and you failed…”

“Give it a break, Devil!” I got a bit angry now “Just wait until the first post is published and read it yourself!” I told them the first post will be published in Austria in the morning, which would be night time for us.

I had to get out of here and left them sitting in the kitchen while I went for a run. This is the reason why my post was a little bit late today.

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Categories Art, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life, Relationships, Social Network
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