Nell came to us with her name, and Kip was an unexpected addition to the family and was named on the fly. The others, Tess and Venn, had their names before the actual dogs existed. It wasn’t so much a case of finding a name for the dog as finding a dog for the name.
When I say name, I really mean names. Probably in contradiction to every good bit of dog training advice, our dogs have enjoyed and responded to an array of different names for different circumstances. Kip has also been Kipper, Capstan Kipperton III (reverse-engineered faux kennel club name), Boggins (after the Adam Buxton character), Boggins the Bog and Bilbo Boggins to list the more savoury and printable ones. Similarly Tess also went by Tessy-Two Shoes (white socks), Two Shoes, Tessellation, The Tessellator, Badger, Badger-Boo and Who-da-Boo. It seems a bit tragic committed to paper, but there we are.
So the new pup is called Venn, and in the overlapping traits of our other dogs the intersection point could arguably be close to the perfect pooch: the optimism and vigour of Kip, the calm placid nature of Tess, and the impeccable good manners and training of Nell. Knowing our luck though, we would be more likely to end up with a funny-looking, hyperactive monster that barks constantly, hates change and insists on licking the side window of the vehicle every time a car passes in the opposite direction.
Venn, however, is not named after the Venn of the diagram fame. She is named (as was Tess) after a Thomas Hardy character, in this case Diggory Venn from The Return of the Native. As discussed above, the name has been kicking around in our minds longer than the dog has, but Diggory is a boy’s name and anyway it clearly breaks the unspoken rule that all working dogs should have a single syllable name. So Venn it is; I’ll give it six months before she is also answering to Dig-the-Dog, Hickory-Diggory Dog etc, etc
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