Purdy

[Lesley Jones]

Well... here she is! The cause of a lot of my worry and also a great deal of joy (and also the culprit for me coming down with septicaemia last year). If you want to read most of her story, you can find it on my friend's web site here Purdy. This was taken for the Animal Health Trust calendar a few years ago and was printed as a gift for her neurosurgeon. The last cibachrome I ever had done takes pride of place on her office wall

 

[Dave Green]

Nice Kitteh!

 

[Lesley Jones]

Cheers Dave! Last year we were bringing her back from Newmarket after she got pneumonia and we stopped at the motorway services in Bishops Stortford. I had Purdy on a harness in the busy car park and she was mugging everybody for a fuss

 

[Dave Green]

You'd need those steel mesh gloves chefs wear to put a harness on my kitty! LOL!

 

[Lesley Jones]

At one point we had eighteen cats. Most of them were trained to wear a harness so we could get them in the garden on the Freedom Fence. We figured it was better training them on that than having them come to grief on the lane or run into next door's gamekeeper...

 

[Dave Green]

Freedom Fence?

What the heck is one of those?

 

[Lesley Jones]

It keeps them on our property. We have about two and a half acres, a box of tricks in the shed and a wire running round the boundary. The cats wear a collar with a receiver and they get an audible warning if they go near the edge. I've probably trained more cats on the system than anyone else and they have all been great - from one brain damaged cat to ex-ferals. They are all happy and not one killed or injured on the lane

 

[Dave Green]

Marvellous!

 

[Pete Askew]

Lovely characterful shot Lesley. I now have visions of the feline counterpart of Gromit studying 'Electronics for Cats' trying to bypass the security system in the dead of night!! If you wake up wearing a strange collar one morning don't be surprised!!

 

[Brian Moore]

It is a great shot of the cat--and I'm no cat lover. (Don't have anything against them per se, its just that Sadie is enough cat for me.)

I saw a film some months ago with my wife and kids. "We Bought A Zoo" it was called. I didn't think I would, but I enjoyed it. It takes place in California (you can tell by the occasional reference in the dialog--San Diego, 405 Freeway, etc.) but after seeing in the credits that it was based on a true story I looked it up on the web. Turns out the real life version took place in England. I'm wondering if it was you Lesley?

 

[Chris Dodkin]

Now that's a nervous looking moggy

Amazing eyes Lesley - lovely shot

 

[Lesley Jones]

For Pete - we nearly have one of those already. He's a Devon Rex and is called Gremlin. His nickname is Klepto Kitty. Mostly he just likes to steal things like my earrings or lip salve and hide them. I once found a pair of earrings hidden in my shoes. My husband regularly has to clean out under the fridge which is another favourite place. He retrieves like a dog too!

For Brian - we heard of the film, but our lot don't help us earn a living, they just keep us poor.

Chris - interesting that you spotted that. Purdy isn't nervous at all. In fact she is the most spirited cat I have ever known. However, the brain tumour has left her wobbly and for this shot my husband had her on a harness and he was just out of sight underneath the branch. (Normally I don't plan shots, but the AHT wanted her as a calendar girl and we only had one weekend to come up with an image). It's hard getting a normal expression, but she is very happy indeed