Carly has long been an advocate of rehoming dogs. But she has two elderly cats and even when the rehoming centres say their dog is fine with cats, Carly knows this isn’t always true. Certainly, her last rescue, Bryn, a tri-colour collie, was pretty appalling with cats. Being carried around in a large dog’s mouth is hardly good for a cat’s self-esteem. Carly kept the cats when she got divorced. Ades the dogs. But they weren’t really what he did in fact want, and so he shifted them off to his erstwhile secretary.
And Carly is lonely and feels that as she has grown up children and she isn’t in a relationship, now might be a good time to get a puppy. And it just so happens one of her oldest school friends Rebecca is going to breed her dog, the inimitable Doris. There is a close connection here. For years, Carly has been telling Rebecca and her husband Bill that, as they live out of London, then a dog is a must. And so, they followed Carly’s instructions. Always better to do that…
Firstly, they had Ruby, then Doris. And Doris is the joke name that Ades calls her. After Sid and Doris Bonkers from Neasden in Private Eye – a satirical political magazine that Ades rather favours. So now Rebecca and Bill have two dogs. And they’re going to breed Doris. Ruby belongs to Bill and is too old to have pups. Oh, and Ruby was a rescue too and so already ‘done’. For a number of years Rebecca thinks about who she will ask to mate with Doris who is a mixture of retriever, duck-toller and collie. She thinks of Milo, a rather skinny whippet so the puppies would be lurchers by definition but that doesn’t work. Milo is rather clueless about what to do when Doris is on heat.
In the end Rebecca settles for a red working cocker spaniel who has fathered other litters. He has form. Hey presto it works, and mid-June 2022 Doris has a litter of six female puppies exactly 63 days later. Rebecca and Bill take this puppy business very seriously. They have all the kit and Doris is only going to be having one litter. None of this puppy farming nonsense. Carly goes down to visit the puppies when they are four weeks old. They are now running around and being fed kibble whilst still breastfeeding. Carly doesn’t really mind which puppy she has and because of her work commitments she is allowed to take the last puppy who by default has not been chosen by the other five families. This makes it easier for Carly. What if she chose badly? Anyway, the puppy that was left was the smallest and calmest. Excellent for a puppy coming to live in deepest, darkest Walthamstow. The ‘unchosen’ puppy.
Rebecca wants to start calling Carly’s unchosen puppy by her name. Carly, Tobes and Boo spend a long time choosing. They look at Hebrew, Norwegian and German girls’ names. In the end the shortlist is Talulah, Delilah, Dizzy and Mary. They narrow it down to Talulah. Everyone seems content until Boo discovers a problem. But, by then, Rebecca is calling this small, calm unchosen puppy by that name. Boo’s problem is that Talulah is going to come to live in Israel when Carly moves there 15 months after Talulah’s birth. And in Hebrew Boo has found that Tatuleh means jerk. But this is not a similar root with that additional middle ‘t’. And instead, Carly goes around telling everyone that her puppy is called Talulah the Jerk. She thinks it will rather suit her.
When it is time for Talulah to make the journey back to London with Carly, she goes down to Dorset with Boo and Tobes to collect her. Everyone stays over and they eat venison which is a novelty and delicious. And Carly can catch up with Rebecca the morning before they leave whilst her children spend time sorting out wood with Bill. This is very novel for city kids. Talulah has a very eventful day. Before she leaves Doris and her human family, she gets a beaded collar, has a swim and journeys in a travel pen on a train and on the tube. She sleeps most of the time and isn’t the least bit bothered. Carly is keen for her to have as many experiences as possible as a puppy so she doesn’t get anxious or frightened. She meets the cats Fatne and Gus who are nonplussed. She tries very hard to engage them in play. And when they aren’t interested, she barks at them. This is actually the only time she barks. She does cry at first in her pen at night. But during the day she is mostly bouncing around or flat out asleep.
The Jewish mother in Carly is a bit perturbed as Talulah isn’t much interested in her food. But after a week this changes, and she is a full on food scavenger. Oh, and pooh eater. It seems this is normal for dogs. If rather disgusting. And Talulah is so keen on poohs she dives into the cat litter to eat waste from other species. Sometimes she doesn’t eat her own pooh. Mostly because it is multicoloured with large bits of colourful plastic she has eaten. Carly has made a mental note to self. Eating pooh is to STOP. By writing it in red shouty capitals Carly really means this…
Boo is going to spend most of the first week training her. Carly zips off to work on her bike and whilst cycling down Blythe Road she notices a buggy on the street. She quickly messages Boo who is keen to march around like a mad old woman with a dog in a buggy. Boo takes the puppy with her there to collect it and henceforth this is Talulah’s favourite way to get around. Usually in the bottom section meant for bags and shopping. It means Carly and Boo can get her to the park where she can then run around. There are very few parks near where they live. But there is a lovely cemetery about a mile away. Talulah loves running around the higgledy, piggledy graves. And no one seems to be there to tell her to put Talulah back on her lead. Phew…
Carly has taken Talulah to other parks. She loves Waterlow park near her work. Talulah is pretty good at not running off. And, as she is fairly keen on treats, it doesn’t take much to lure her back. But she does have a bit of a problem with other people’s buggies. If the lower section isn’t stuffed to the brim with shopping, Talulah hops in. Mostly the buggy owners find this funny but as Talulah gets larger and less puppy-cute she will have to desist from this behaviour. At least, it clearly signals to Carly or Boo when she is tired.
And whereas Boo is great with Talulah, Tobes less so. One morning Carly asked her son to mind Talulah for an hour or so. When she returned Tobes was at his wits end. Talulah had eaten his headphones, and Carly was not only annoyed but rather worried as the puppy had eaten four sewing needles too. Tobes says he had never asked for a puppy, and he much prefers cats. And so, unless he takes her for a walk, Carly won’t expect anything much from Tobes with regard to puppy sitting. The needles in the end turned up in Tobes’ bed so at least she hadn’t swallowed them. But Talulah is a bit of a devil when it comes to finding things. She has ruined a number of socks, balls of yarn and dishcloths. Recently Carly went to the local pool in her pyjamas planning on dressing for the day after her swim and shower. She dried thoroughly and put on her bra. She had previously noted that there was a tear in one of the sides. Easy enough to mend. And now she looked down. Her nipple was popping out of her bra. Oh no! Talulah had made a hole which wasn’t going to be repairable in the central section. Grrrrrrrrrrr. Bras are expensive. Because Carly likes to go away a great deal, she has persuaded Mike and Tom to have her some of the time. This gay couple have never had children and need to be empowered to be strict with her. Certainly not staying up all night soothing her because she cries so pitifully. They will never be able to cope with the ensuing fatigue. But they do have her and after a bit of time she is doing her business in the right place and they can leave her, albeit reluctantly, in her crate at night. They even give Talulah her first bath. She’s not that keen on hairdryers, they find, even though Tom was a hairdresser with Vidal Sassoon in a former life. And they try hard to teach her tricks. She is great at “Sit”. She came from Dorset already trained to do that. But she’s still rather rubbish at “Paw”. Carly is secretly rather pleased. Giving a paw to a human feels degrading as well as stupid. So, Carly and Talulah are in complete agreement about failing to learn that trick. On balance, although Carly is rather worn out by this exuberant puppy Talulah, she is very pleased to have her in her life. Even if it’s part-time.
