Gertrude the gosling

One fine summer's day in the middle of winter, Gertrude the gosling hatched from her egg, took one look around her, climbed back inside again and went back to sleep.

Unfortunately for Gertrude, she slept for so long that her mum thought she was dead and deserted her. Gertrude wasn't too upset by this however, having never met her. But poor Gertrude was only little and couldn't possibly survive in the big bad world by herself, so she went in search of someone who would be her mum. Little Gertrude searched low and high, outside and in but she couldn't find anyone who would be her mum. She asked all the animals she met but they all had an excuse.

When she asked the Unicorn if she would protect her with her horn, the proud Unicorn claimed that she was far too busy to help an insignificant gosling, and continued to count all the blades of grass in her field. Twice.

So Gertrude asked a pack of Lemmings if the would let her join their close-knit family. But unfortunately, they were all too busy jumping off the nearest cliff to be of any use to her.

Then Gertrude asked a Dodo if he would keep her safe and warm under his green fur coat. The Dodo laughed so hard at this suggestion that he dropped down dead and the entire species became extinct.

Rather disheartened by this, Gertrude decided to curl up in a ball and die.

Just before she left this cruel world behind, she opened her eyes one last time to see a beautiful hot air balloon float across the sky. A voice from above cried out:

"Look out below..."

A moment later a brown, funny shaped object fell from the sky and landed close to where Gertrude was ling. Curious, she decided to take a look and found lying on the ground, a rubber chicken.

"Mummy!" cried Gertrude and hugged the rubber chicken tight against her, and since the rubber chicken, being made out of rubber hence the name, could not correct her on this, Gertrude adopted the chicken as her new mum.

From that day on, Gertrude lived happily ever after with her rubber chicken mum and a baby lemming that got left behind when his parents all jumped over the cliff.