Hairy Maclary.... The dog isn't called Blitzer Maloney

[5FootMama]

He's called BITZER Maloney.
I have been reading this as Blitzer for about 8 years until my friend queried this the other day 😬

Whoops!!

Love, love, loved these books so much and ds's nickname was Slinky Malinki for ages.

I didn't realise they were from NZ, either!

And paw and door rhyme in my accent. Most of England, though not all, is non-rhotic.

I very much need a Miss Plum in my life. She appears at exactly the right moment and makes everything ok!

@PurePeppermint

I love that these are popular in the UK - do you all know Donaldson’s Dairy is a corner store? I always think of it as such a kiwi thing.

No!

I always thought it was an actual dairy. Like with cows and everything :)

Bottomley potts!!! Is my cuss of choice when I can’t actually swear!

Doesn't anyone have a fondness for poor old Hercules Morse??

@00100001

Doesn't anyone have a fondness for poor old Hercules Morse??

As big as a horse

Oh we had a real life Slinky Malinki, such a beautiful and feisty cat, blacker than black with bright yellow eyes and a kick at the end of his very long tail. He brought home neighbours' socks and pants, so many treasures.

We were so shocked when he was run over. All the neighbourhood cats gathered on our deck as if to pay tribute to their leader 😔

We have a Slinky Malinki, although he was taught by his brother Fat Stanley how to eat and is no longer slinky.

I'm just sat over here with my mind absolutely blown that the books are from New Zealand tbh, I can't even address the pronunciation of the names.

My brother always did the best aggressively Glaswegian voice for Scarface claw. I can't tell him, he'll never do it again and start trying a New Zealand accent instead and I've heard his attempt at that before and it ain't pretty.

Mind you for some reason whenever I read Stick Man he had an outrageous French accent and the BBC version just didn't sound right at all. I ruined it for myself, sorry Martin Freeman but good try mate.

@ferneytorro

As I’ll never read it again as daughter is 11, I shall stay saying Blitzer (although actually it does make sense now). I even misread Bitzer as Biter though initially so no hope. This is a bit like when someone tells you what the real words to a song are!! Meatloaf isn’t the gasboard light apparently it’s dashboard!!!

‘Gasboard light’ I think I love you 🤣

Meatloaf fan since childhood here, very young me and DSis had a long discussion once about what he was singing at the end of ‘Dead Ringer for Love’... the ‘Dead Ringer’ repeated part. We came up with ‘dead ring-pull’. Because of course he’d be singing about a soft drink can opening method...

I sometimes wonder how I lived to 40...

These are DD's absolute favourites she loves Scarface Claw so much that she turns to the back of the other books to look at the little picture of him in the 'other books you might like' section. The toddler years are manic but so cute too.

Another one shocked at the books originating in NZ.

Pondering this now… Bottomley? Would a dog owner really want to shout ‘Bottomley!’ across a park?

This makes me think of that famous video of some bloke shouting for his dog across Richmond Park - “Fenton! Fentoooon!”

We love the Hairy Mclairy series here (and by we, I mean me) my 'mum' joke used to be to routinely say "Viktor Von'crumb with the very shiny bum!" to see if the kids were listening or not.

My twins loved the Hairy Maclary books but their absolute favourite (and mine ) was Slinky Malinki "Catflaps"

" The house was asleep
It was silent and still
With flickering shadows
On ceiling and sill.."

I used to know most of the book off by heart so I could read it in the dark bedtime - they were usually fast asleep within minutes.

@LublinToDublin

I love these books. My mind was blown when I found out that a "dairy" in New Zealand is a shop like a convenience store / corner shop!! I'd always pictured Hairy Maclary in Donaldson's dairy surrounded by milk churns

We had dairies in Scotland when I was a kid. Must be the Scottish influence in NZ. We loved these when ds was little - a relative in NZ sent them over.

I remember saying to DS when he was about 3 when we saw a Dalmatian look there's Bottomley Potts. The lady played along and asked how did we know his name unless of course it really was his name.

We still have a "dairy" here. Village on the west coast of Scotland.

My very favourite is Slinky. My 5 kids all loved these. They each had their favourite book and character. I'm slightly sad that they are all adults who don't want kids so I might not have grandchildren to read these with.

One of my dc broke the news to me that it was a nz corner shop. They were in their early teens at the time but just as shocked as me.
I grew up in a farming community and naturally assumed he belonged to an actual dairy, and was the free range sort like the vast majority of dogs from my childhood were.

It’s a story book series, not an actual dog.

WHAT?!?

I love Bottomley Potts. They are my favourite books.

My children are now truculent teens but I can still recite Hairy McClary from memory.

We love all these books too, and I was so excited to find them all on YouTube! The toddler was quite pleased too... She loves the Slinky Malinki books best but I’m rather fond of Forget-me-not and Rumpus at the Vet.

@LublinToDublin

I love these books. My mind was blown when I found out that a "dairy" in New Zealand is a shop like a convenience store / corner shop!! I'd always pictured Hairy Maclary in Donaldson's dairy surrounded by milk churns

Wait... what??

Yes it’s dairy as in the place you buy your milk eggs etc from. I never knew some places in Scotland use it in that sense too!

I only recently realised they were popular outside NZ, when the duchess of Cornwall said it was her favourite kids book.

We used to live in new Zealand and had to leave our own lovely Slinky malinky and scarface claw behind. broke my heart even though it was twenty years ago now.