Cats

A bit of good news: Japan’s “Cat Island”

Last weekend we mentioned Tashirojima, Japan’s “Cat Island”. The island is populated by perhaps thousands of cats and 100 or so elderly human residents. The fear at first was that the island, right near the epicenter of the earthquake and tsunami, was lost. This week, we saw this article Discovery News reporting that the island survived!

Tashirojima, otherwise known as Japan’s “Cat Island” due to its numerous feline inhabitants, is intact after the recent devastating 9-magnitude earthquake and resulting tsunami, according to Japan Earthquake Animal Rescue and Support. However, like so many others devastated by the disaster, both the human and feline residents of the island need help.

They quote the group Japan Earthquake Animal Relief, which reported the news on their Facebook page:

Just to give everyone an update on Tashirojima, the cat island. The people and cats are safe but short of food. A volunteer looked into transporting food by boat, but there is too much debris in the water. A helicopter is the only way. The army will probably get a helicopter ready soon so we are looking into the possibility of asking them to take cat food too.

Additional information via this blog post, along with some beautiful photos.

It is a rare bit of good news in a disaster that seems to be getting worse every day, especially now with the nuclear disaster. It could be another round of danger for this island and extraordinary number of people in coming days.

You can support the efforts of Japan Earthquake Animal Relief and see more information on Facebook. They are a coalition of at least two animal-relief organizations working together. World Vets also has a fund for disaster relief in Japan.

I didn’t think it would be possible to make this a “Cat and Synthesizer” post, but I did read via matrixsynth, that is matching donations to SXSW’s Japan relief fund with subscriptions. (Puremagnetik is a subscription service for sound/instrument packs for use with Ableton Live! and other software environments.)

Weekend Cat Blogging 301: A Sad Day

March 11 was a sad day.

It is with a heavy heart that we say goodbye to our friend Mickey.

As mentioned earlier this week, he fell very ill and passed away on Friday. He (through his mom) first visited us in late 2007, and they have been regulars on our site ever since, as likely to comment on experimental music shows and photography as Luna’s feline antics. And in turn, we enjoyed getting to know them better through their site. Our thoughts go out to Mom Nancy and the rest of the family today.

We have been closely following the tragic events in Japan after the earthquake and tsunami. Images such as these are heartbreaking, and our thoughts are with the people of Japan right now. While every year brings multiple huge disasters, when it happens somewhere you have visited or affects people you know, it hits harder.

Our friends at Cats of Wildcat Woods have compiled a list of relief organizations. The Red Cross is always a good place to start, and now you can donate via text messages.

There is no information currently on Tashirojima, or “Cat Island”, which is off the eastern coast of Japan in Miyagi Prefecture, near epicenter of the earthquake and tsunami, but the fear is that the island was lost.

Weekend Cat Blogging #301 is hosted by Pam at Sidewalk Shoes.

The Carnival of the Cats will be up this Sunday at Two Little Cavaliers.

And the Friday Ark is at the modulator.

IWW General Strike Poster

Saw this poster on BoingBoing:

Hugh Electronic sez, “The I.W.W. hired Eric Drooker to design posters for a general strike which he is told, now appears imminent in Wisconsin. The Industrial Workers of the World asked him to design versions in Spanish and Arabic, for international solidarity.”

I doubt that general strike is actually imminent in Wisconsin, but one has to admire that poster. Of course, we love black cats, and black and red is great color combination.

Weekend Cat Blogging #300: Return to Normal

Luna looks on at the jumble of furniture, on which the dotara is sitting post performance.  I actually like the geometric formation of the tables pushed together during the construction, and the contrast of the curved musical instrument.

The big concert is now over and done. It mostly went quite beautifully, except for one technical flaw that disrupted the final piece (more on this in a later post).  The construction is also now done.  So we are looking forward to life at home returning to normal.

We now have the time and opportunity to put the apartment back together, and do those mundane but necessarily things that make up normal life. Oh, and to relax and enjoy a little down time.  At least until the next big creative project begins.  I think we will be starting on Tuesday.

Weekend Cat Blogging #300 is hosted by Mog and Meowza at Mind of Mog. Like us, they seem a bit dazed.

The Carnival of the Cats will be hosted tomorrow by Nikita and Elivra at Meowsings of an Opinionated Pussycat.

And the Friday Ark is at the modulator.

Some preparation for March 4 concert

A late evening preparing for the upcoming Regents’ Lecture concert, with an assist from Luna:

Here Luna poses with TouchOSC on the iPad, which is becoming one of the main control surfaces I will be using to control Open Sound World.  Last night I was building the synthesis infrastructure for the new piece, a combination of drum sampling and spatialized additive synthesis – at least four separate additive synthesis models that are algorithmically generated based on input from the iPad.  Against this will be electronic drum sounds and an Afro-Cuban rhythm detail.  I really won’t know the exact shape of this piece until I work with CNMAT’s speaker array.

I also learned from the Saturday’s performance in Oakland that I will need to refine the control on TouchOSC for the new implementation of my piece Charmer:Firmament.  It was very well received, with descriptions like “beautiful” and “meditative”, but it was difficult to control compared to the Wacom graphics tablet.  I will try a different mix of controls on the iPad to see if it works better.

Weekend Cat Blogging #299

Weekend Cat Blogging #299 will be hosted here at CatSynth.  It’s like hosting #300, but one less. This comes in the midst of a busy weekend, including a performance tomorrow night and preparations for a big concert one week from now, but with some proper rest we should be ready to handle everything.

As usual, to participate please leave a comment on this post with a link to your contribution, or you can tweet us @catsynth with hashtag #WCB.  (Note that we won’t get to the round-up until Sunday due to the performances and other commitments.)

And now let us get on with the round-up.

Cats love boxes.  It’s a well-comfirmed fact.  But if one needs even more evidence, check out this cute cat-in-a-box picture courtesy of Pam’s Sidewalk Shoes.

It looks like there is a campaign underway at Mom’s Sunday Cafe concerning someone’s desire for a new yellow truck with gray interior…or perhaps just an interesting color fashion statement:

Jules is a very patient model for his mom’s experiments with Photoshop at Judi’s Mind of Matter.  I do like the direction the image is going, pushing the contrast to an extreme, where only Jules and the wall sockets are visible.

Luna and Zulu T Katt share a photo of Zulu enjoying a drink in the faucet.  It’s interesting how some cats seem to enjoy running water while others do not – nowhere near the universal appeal of boxes.

We will continue with the round-up later this afternoon.

The Cats of Wildcat Woods have taken a more subtle approach to Photo Hunt: Mostly Black.  The tabbies and tortoiseshells including Woody, Chica and Joey all have black as part of their markings.  They are also looking for a home for mostly black cat Avon.  Please click on her Petfinder link to find out more info.

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At Meowsings of an Opinionated Pussycat, Elvira is enjoying her three two play cubes.

It looks like the last two have suffered from some rather enthusiastic clawing. She looks so innocent in that picture, though.

Finally, Tsunami is The Mighty Hunter Create with Joy:

We recognized Tsunami’s photo from this past Wordless Wednesday.

That concludes the Weekend Cat Blogging roundup for now. Thanks for being patient, and for the supporting words on the music events this week (last night’s performance in Oakland went quite well).