I was trying to think of a good Song of the Week when Darcy – Darcy is my dog – asked, “When are you going to do one of my people’s songs?” I told her that if she meant “Darcy Farrow,” I had already written about that and anyone could read it here. She said, “No, not ‘Darcy Farrow.’ The Bob Song.” “Ah,” I said, “the Bob Song. We could do that.”
The Bob Song is actually called “Bob the Kelpie” and was written and performed by Australian Don Spencer. Before getting to the song, let me give you a little background. We adopted Darcy Through a group called Rocky Mountain Puppy Rescue. No one knew exactly what breed Darcy is, but we were told that she might be part Kelpie.
The Australian Kelpie is Australia’s most popular working dog. It is great at herding, is extremely intelligent and is a great pet for anyone who wants an active, enthusiastic, loyal (but independent) companion. Darcy has grown to be a bit smaller than a Kelpie and somewhat more elongated. Still, she thinks she is a Kelpie, and as part of her evidence she offers these photos. On the left is a picture of a Kelpie puppy she found on the internet, and on the right is Darcy as a puppy:
Don Spencer seems to be an interesting guy. He was an outstanding field hockey player in high school, but when he was 17 he left Australia to hitchhike around Africa. A few years later became a member of Kenya’s Olympic Hockey Team and also competed at high levels in rugby, cricket and table tennis.
While in Kenya he met Roger Whittaker. Whittaker is known somewhat in the United States as a performer of easy-listening pop music, but is a much bigger star in other parts of the world, having over 250 silver, gold and platinum albums. Don Spencer began touring and writing songs with Whittaker, who was born in Nairobi. From Kenya, Spencer moved to London to pursue a musical career. He had a hit record called “Fireball XL5,” which was the theme song of a TV series of the same name; and he toured and performed with groups such as the Rolling Stones, the Four Seasons and the Hollies.
Spencer extended his artistic work into broadcasting and was host of the popular children’s program, Playschool for 17 years in the UK and for 22 years in Australia. In 2002 he founded the non-profit Australian Children’s Musical Foundation and in 2007 he received the prestigious Order of Australia Medal. One of his children – daughter Danielle – is married to movie star Russell Crowe, though I read on Wikipedia that they are now “separated.”
Don Spencer has made hundreds of recordings and published more than 500 songs, one of which is “Bob the Kelpie”; and Darcy would like to let you listen to that one now.
BOB THE KELPIE
By Don Spencer and Allan Caswell
CHORUS:
Sheep are cute,
Sheep are beaut,
Sheep are soft and curly.
But when I take them into town,
I have to start off early,
‘Cause they never go the way I want,
So I need someone to help me –
I just give a whistle,
And I call for Bob the Kelpie.
Bob the Kelpie he’s my dog,
And though he’s not too pretty.
He’s worth more than all those fancy
Dogs up in the city.
He works hard in the yard
To show the sheep who’s boss,
I guess they’ve learned by now it doesn’t
Pay to make Bob cross.
CHORUS X 2
Bob the Kelpie he’s my mate,
He never lets me down.
He loves to ride in the back of the Ute
When we go into town.
And we never have to lock it up,
With Bob there for protection,
‘Cause he will bark at anything
That comes in his direction.
CHORUS X 2
Yes I just give a whistle…
I just give a whistle,
And I call for Bob the Kelpie.
Published by MCA-Gilbey
“Bob the dog, he’s not too pretty like all those fancy dogs up in the city…” Always nice to find a simpatico namesake. Bob is ubiquitous. Notable namesakes who come to mind include Dylan and Marley as well as Keeshan (Captain Kangaroo and Clarabell the Clown on Howdy Doody), Smith (Buffalo Bob, also HD), Fosse (Type A Bob), Ross (Type B Bob), Feller (Fast Bob), Silent (ONLY because of the word “askewniverse”), Weir (Grateful for him), Denver (Maynard, NOT Gilligan)… There are more, I’m fairly sure of it. Oh, yeah! I have a “Bob the Builder” lunchbox I treasure because his picture is on it and he looks a lot like me, almost a doppelganger thing going on there. His ears are just a little rounder and I have a bit more hair, but other than that we could be twins.
After studying Darcy’s baby picture it appears to me that she and Charlie have a common ancestor, a prehistoric pan-dimensional fence jumper who landed in Ashdown Forest and added a gene for devastating puppy cuteness to their line after some shenanigans at Pooh’s Corner and a rollick through the Hundred Acre Wood. I have no idea how their descendants found their way back to this universe – or why, all things considered – but am glad they did.
PS: We home-schooled Charlie and took pains to make sure he was NEVER exposed to the internet. He did quite well, and we realized all the precautions and oversight we provided had been unnecessary when he presented us one day with a book he had written entitled “Everything I Need to Know I Already Knew.”
Darcy was mostly home schooled, too. When she was a puppy we did a basic obedience class for an hour on Saturday mornings for 4 or 5 weeks. She taught us to let her sleep on the couch, feed her scraps from the table and things like that.
Charlie’s predecessor, Bud – also a Yellow Lab – and I tried the Formal Obedience Class thing. Once. On the first day the first thing we practiced was walking around the room in a circle on leash. By the second turn around the room we both knew the whole deal was a bad fit for a couple of independent, basically untrainable cusses like us. We dashed out an open door before the trainer could stop us, piled into the truck and high-tailed it out of there. After we’d got a couple of blocks away we agreed that we were lucky to escape and vowed to never go there again.
For months afterward, every time we drove by the community center where the class had been held, two out of three pairs of eyeballs in the truck rolled nervously in that direction. We were finally able to stop doing that when Lenore got tired of it and told us to get over ourselves.
Interestingly, before we had Darcy we had a Siberian Husky named Emmy. When she was about six months old, our son Michael was about seven years old. Emmy was quite rambunctious causing Michael to be very timid around her. We decided it might help if we enrolled Emmy for a few obedience lessons and let Michael come along. Well, they said that he was too young to participate, so he had to sit on the side and watched. That did help some because it gave him a chance to see how smart Emmy was and how well she could do things people told her. Emmy excelled in everything except heeling – Siberian Huskies do not like to heel. I didn’t particularly like the hand signals or asking a Husky to heel or some of the other formalities; so in the end Emmy passed easily, but I failed.
Hi Lou –
I am very impressed that you have been able to train Darcy to use the internet.
Hope you are well.
Cheers,
Greg
Things are different than when we were growing up, Greg. Today, puppies are exposed to electronics and digital communications almost from the time they are born. I didn’t have to teach Darcy anything. She probably knows more than I do about the internet. She also learns quickly because she is doing everything in dog years.