The cat story so far...
I met Jeff in June 2003 when I first moved to Manchester. Part of the deal for moving into the house I'd found was that I had to look after my landlord Gavin's, cat - the rent came a little cheaper if I bought his food, took over his vet bills, etc.
See live pictures of Jeff - click here
He was originally found as a stray on the streets of Longsight in Manchester about 2 months before I had met him. He was missing a lot of fur back then, had a terrible ear mite problem and had befriended my landlord because he used to leave food out for him.
He gradually found his way into the house and was adopted by Gavin and his wife. Thinking he was a girl at the time, they called him 'Audrey' (because of his huge green eyes, like Audrey Hepburn's), but after taking him to the vets and discovering that he was a boy, decided to call him 'Hepburn'.
Gavin had to move to Germany because his wife had found a new job there, so had to put the house up for rent. I was looking for work in Manchester at the time and saw the house advertised. Gavin had built quite a bond with him by the time I moved in but decided that the fairest thing to do, rather than taking Jeff through qaurantine, would be to keep him in the environment he was used to and have his new tenant look after him. After being used to having a dog, and never being particularly fond of cats beforehand, I wasn't too sure about this.
'Cats aren't as affectionate as dogs - they're justaloof, aren't as lovable as dogs and don't really care about anyone but themselves', I remember thinking at the time.
How wrong I was!
OK, he's aloof, but that's just part of the appeal! He had the largest eyes I'd ever seen in a cat and was incredibly cute, impossibly furry, relentlessly playful and cheeky with it!. I never realised before I met Jeff how much character cats can have, and after only having spent a few hours with him, knew that we would not be parted.
Two syllables are far too many for the name of a pet in my opinion, so I renamed him Jeff. He wasn't named after anyone in particular - he just looked and acted like a Jeff!
Now, Longsight isn't the nicest of places to live. There's a big crime problem there - mainly drugs, guns, car theft and young kids on stupidly tiny motorcycles causing mayhem and chaos. By December 2005, and after having seen one too many cars burnt out right outside my window, I was thankfully in a position to find accommodation somewhere a little more pleasant. I was a little concerned about moving Jeff from the environment he was used to though.
Thankfully, the internet is a marvellous resource for information on just about anything and I soon found that, although moving house is not ideal for a cat, they can quite easily adapt to a new place if you follow certain guidelines.
By then, I'd found a lovely house in Salford Quays. A very quiet, peaceful area of Manchester with lots of space in which a young cat can play safely. We moved in and Jeff took to his new surroundings surprisingly quickly. After just a couple of weeks, he was strutting around the neighbourhood like he owned it!
We recently moved house again (to Chorlton in Manchester) and have settled in quite well now. We have a large back garden now and plenty of surrounding greenery in which Jeff can adventure and scare off the neighbouring cats.
I hope you enjoy this site and if you happen to catch Jeff on the Jeffcam, please send me your pictures!
