And, as fate would have it, Jinx is the gentlest, most good natured, whole male I've ever known. Actually, I shouldn't even qualify that statement by using the term "whole male". Or any other term for that matter. He has never, ever had a harsh word to say to me. Not during bathing or grooming, never so much as a "grrrr". And for those of you who have had to "convince" even the sweetest of TAs to "let" you cut their nails, you surely know how rare this temperament is! Jinx just never challenged me over anything. And, AS a whole male, our first and only male who could truly claim to be an alpha, this truly is remarkable. What a great cat!
At any rate, as much as you'll hear about how gorgeous this cat is, or what an awesome show career that one had, the bottom line for us is temperament. We certainly wouldn't breed with a cat that's ugly now, would we? And Jinx has contributed more to our breeding program than any other cat we own: perfect profiles, fabulous wedges, tons of coat AND outstanding temperament. He's such a rock solid fellow that I even wanted to show him even though he came to us an adult already at 2 years old. His ear set had faded such that he couldn't have earned his Grand Champion title in the CFA. But I honestly thought he deserved to show himself off a bit and earn his Champion title anyway. Nonetheless, silly me believed when I was told that you couldn't take an adult cat into a show hall and have them behave in the least. To be sure, a show hall loaded with cats and cat smells (as well as herds of noisy visitors) is not a welcome scene for the average cat. But I still believe in my heart that Jinx would have kissed every judge he met! His daughter Gracie did when she was first shown at almost 2 years old! Actually, Jinx isn't so much a "kisser" as he is a head-butter, having purrfected the art of butting up to your chin with his head and then running his whole cat across your cheek. Oh well...
We retired Jinx in February of 2007, without a title to his name. As time passes, this date will fade into the history of our breeding program. But I will always miss this wonderful friend and I will always keep this page on our website. Jinx has contributed far too much to our breeding program, and on to other breeders working with his descendants as well, to ever forget him. Nothing brightened my day quite like going into the boys' room and having this handsome fellow stretch up on his back legs and paw at me for ear scratches and some loving. Many thanks to Heather for loving this boy so much over the years that she just she just had to adopt him when she saw that he was available!