Once upon a long ago, in a time known as the 1990’s, two teenagers fell in love. And then one of them gave the other a plush hedgehog.

In the same distant time, there existed a usenet group called alt.fan.pratchett. And in this group appeared a signature that would start an early internet meme.

     \\\\\       -------->jimmy@juggler.demon.co.uk<-----------
    \\\\\\\__o  Bringing hedgehogs to the common folk since 1994.
____\\\\\\\/___________________________________________________
                        <holyhorns>

(See the collection on L-Space!)

This signature may look familiar to you if you’ve ever received an email from my personal gmail account, which uses the sig

-{{{{_.—-The Frazzled Hedgehog
_}}}}’/___Bringing Disorder to the World Since 19**

Jimmy and I were, of course, the teenagers from the opening paragraph. We’re still very much in love. And still collecting hedgehogs.

That first plush hedgehog led over decades to a collection that now spans multiple ledges in our home, known as Hedgie Haven. You may have noticed my books are all released by Hedgie Press. At this point, I feel our daughter was lucky we didn’t name her Hedgehog. Although maybe we should have…

Naturally, we were married on February 2nd, aka Hedgehog Day.*

So while most of the US is observing Groundhog Day, my beloved and I are celebrating Hedgehog Day and our 27th wedding anniversary.

So… Happy Hedgehog Day, Jimmy. I love you do the core of my spikey heart.

Have a rendition of a Discworld classic…

*Looking at a mammal coming out of hibernation and trying to guess the weather is an old European tradition. The story goes that in ancient Rome, they used hedgehogs.