CATSYNTH

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Category: Luna

  • Weekend Cat Blogging #74: Preparing for New Orleans radio performance

    Lali at Lali et Cie is hosting Weekend Cat Blogging soixante-dix quatre (I never could get the hang of French numbers). And how appropriate to be blogging this weekend from one of America's great cities with French heritage, New Orleans. I am here attending the International Computer Music Conference (ICMC), and will be performing a piece live on local public radio WTUL FM. For anyone interested in listening in, it will be streaming live online, next Friday at 1PM CST US (check out my main site for more info.

    Needless to say, I've been scrambling a bit to get ready for the trip in general, and the performance in particular. I'll post more about the music and technology later this weekend, but for now it's enough to appreciate that Luna has been keeping me company in the studio as I work out some nasty bugs in the software for the piece:

    She seems to enjoy sitting on my lap while I work. And it's great to have her sharing in some small part of the creative process.

    I think this closeup qualifies as a “catsynth pic.” Luna poses with laptop, E-MU Xboard, E-MU Vintage Pro and circuit-bent VTech toy phone.

    In my absence, Luna is being well cared for courtesy of Ronni West's Happy At Home Cat Sitting.

  • Halloween Weekend Cat Blogging: Black Cat Appreciation

    This special Halloween edition of Weekend Cat Blogging is being hosted by Linda and Aggie over at kayaksoup. It is a lovely warm sunny October afternoon here on the left coast, and Luna has some lovely harvest-themed pictures to share:

    Here Luna obliges us with the traditional Halloween pose:

    Sadly, Halloween can be a difficult time for cats in the United States, especially black kitties. The image of the black cat as “bad luck” or witches' familiars permeate folklore as well as the pop culture and commerce surrounding Halloween. Ritual sacrifice and harm to black cats is largely documented to be an urban legend, but the fiction can influence kids. Indeed, animal killing and abuse does rise around halloween mostly because of “poorly-behaved kids” influenced by the folk and popular images:

    Far too often, the animals are tortured and sacrificed during pseudo satanic-based rituals.

    “But not by the real religious satanic groups,” [Lillian Dubois-Tercero, president and executive director of Arizona Pet Line] stressed. “They don't sacrifice cats and dogs. It's the idiot juveniles (who are) responsible who don't know what they're doing.”

    This is one reason why many shelters control (or ban) adoptions of black cats in the weeks leading up to and immediately after Halloween. However, shelters are trying to minimize another problem faced by black cats around Halloween – people “adopting” them as living decorations, trying to go one better than the ubiquitous paper cutouts. Even if not specifically “hurt,” many of these cats are apparently returned to the shelters after Halloween. Such “shelter whiplash” can be traumatic, and if I were a cat I would lose some of my trust in humans.

    About.com has an excellent article on The Perils of Halloween for Black Cats. We join the author in dubbing October as Black Cat Appreciation Month. Of course, here at CatSynth every day is Black Cat Appreciation Day.

    So be kind to kitties you meet these week, and keep your own feline companions indoors. Might want to keep an eye on some of those kids, too…

    UPDATE (Oct 29): AP has an article today entitled “Black cat adoptions banned on Halloween”, which discusses both the practice as well as potential downsides for already stigmatized black cats:

    Janet, a black cat up for adoption, pauses on a wall ledge at the Kootenai Humane Society, Thursday, Oct. 26, 2006, in Hayden, Idaho. The Kootenai Humane Society is prohibiting all black cat adoptions from mid-October to Nov. 2, fearing the ebony animals could be mistreated as a Halloween prank, or worse, be used in a satanic sacrifice. (AP Photo/ Kirk Mastin)

    Doesn't Janet look a lot like Luna? Such a sweet face…








  • Weekend Cat Blogging #72: The furry encounter

    Jelly and Kamikazee over at I got Two Shoes host this weekend's roundup. Uncle Kamikazee is up to his old antics again.

    We had our own little drama here earlier. Luna was looking out one of her favorite windows here in the studio when one of our neighbors showed up:

    This tuxedo kitty has been in the neighborhood a lot longer than I have, and, well, he thinks he owns the place. That being said, Luna has her own claims to the view out the window, and attempts to let him know who's the queen of this domain. She has a unique sound she uses for encounters with other felines, as can be heard in this Catster video:



    This is as good a time as any to let folks know that Luna has her own profile and blog at Catster, where you can read about this episode from her perspective and watch Furry Encounter Part 2.








  • Weekend Cat Blogging #67

    Luna blends in perfectly with her dad's decor while getting warm on a table above our main heater. The temperature this morning was 49F (10C)! That is a travesty in September, usually the hottest month of the year along the California coast. It's not helping my recovery from whatever ailment has befallen me this week, either.

    Anyhow, being stuck home gives me plenty of time to host Weekend Cat Blogging #67, taking over from last week's host, chefsarahjane. Assuming I'm feeling better over the weekend and things warm up a bit, I'll be spending as much time as I can outside – but that shouldn't stop me from posting updates.

    So send us your feline articles and photos; either leave a comment on this post, or send me a message. Bonus points if you can fit into the cats-with-music-and-art theme of this forum.







  • Weekend Kitty Blogging #71: Silliness and The Mighty Hunter

    This weekend's round-up is being hosted at Rosa's Yummy Yums, featuring Fridolin and Maruschka taking turns with a knit bonnet and looking quite embarrassed. Check out this week's round-up of silly and crazy, but nonetheless extremely cute felines.

    Luna is quite the sophisticated cat, but that doesn't mean she doesn't have her silly moments, such as her fun with boxes last week. She also loves to play with her toy mousies, and goes at them with reckless abandon:

    One of her favorite games is to push them under the couch farther than she can reach, which often leads to amusing scenes like this:

    Indeed, Luna can be quite silly and obsessive when she plays the mighty hunter. I snapped this pic while she was engrossed for 15 to 20 minutes with a bug that fell behind the dresser after she succeeding in swatting it:

    Sweetie, just let it go…








  • Weekend Cat Blogging #66: More Luna in Action

    WCB #66 is being hosted this week by Sarah over at chefsarahjane. Sounds like she is going away on Sunday, and I'm busy today preparing for my set at the headphone festival in SF (see the previous post). Thus, I looked back in my rather extensive collection of Luna photos and came up with this action sequence from last February:




    It was around Valentine's Day and I saw that little pink-heart toy during a routine pet-store run – it was pretty inevitable that I would buy it for her, and as you can see she loved it!

    The toy is still around (probably under the sofa) though the black strings are long gone.





  • Weekend Cat Blogging #70: Cat in a Box

    This weekend's hosts, Boots, Tess and D at The Hidden Paw, have challenged us to produce Cat-in-a-Box submissions for WCB 70. That's not too hard for us, as Luna is quite fond of boxes:

    In the photo above, she is caught in the act of chewing on pieces of her favorite box from Ikea. This is one of her guilty pleasures in life.

    Here, we have Luna encountering an Amazon box in the hallway. I wonder how that got there…


    Visit the round-up for more adorable pictures of cats in boxes, bags, and other sundry containers.








  • virtual pet luna

    Just a random little code-generator I encountered this evening. It seems harmless enough and is too cute not to post, so here it is. Enjoy:

    adopt your own virtual pet!

    Meanwhile, of course, the real Luna wants in on the action, and no virtual imitation compares to the real deal, so over and out.





  • Weekend Cat Blogging #69

    WCB 69 is being hosted by the crew over at The House of (Mostly) Black Cats. We at catsynth heartily approve of the black-cat concept, and encourage readers to check it out.

    Meanwhile, things continue to be foggy, grey and a bit chilly on the California coast, but that doesn't keep Luna from surveying her domain:

    I have another gig coming up tonight that I need to prepare for, with electronics and simple acoustic instruments. Luna of course is in the studio to help with the equipment:







  • Weekend Cat Blogging #68: Luna and Cats of India

    This week, chefsarahjane hosts again. We wish her a happy birthday, and say hi to Tiggy as well. Do visit them and check out this week's round-up.

    Meanwhile, Luna poses with Ganesh for our special WCB feature on Cats of India:

    Inspired by masak-masak's street cats from last week's round-up here at catsynth.com, I present a few cat photos from my trip to India last winter. We begin with this feline and bovine duo from my father's hometown north of Delhi:

    As many readers are probably aware, cows are considered sacred in Hindu culture, and a family cow is treated in many ways as a prized pet. Cats in India don't quite have the same status. Not only do most Indians not consider them as appropriate pets, but some also regard them in a suspicious, even superstitious manner (as have many cultures throughout history, sadly). Thus, most cats are street animals that generally must fend for themselves. As many of us know, cats are supurb hunters and scavengers, so many do manage. I tended to see cats near food establishments, this near-white cat was wandering the dining area of a dormitory in Delhi we stayed at for a couple of nights, begging for scraps (which I of course provided). The grey-striped fellow in the photo below managed to find a good location at the cantina in one of heavily touristed palaces in the city of Jaipur. That probably accounts for its more healthy appearance:

    I did come across this article from IndiaTimes that discusses the state of cats in Indian society. Unfortunately, the HTML seems to have come thru as plain text, which makes it difficult to read.

    Ultimately, I plan to create a photo-essay featuring these and other photos/videos from my trip.