festival

Weekend Cat Blogging and more: It's all about Luna!

Well, I am still in New York this weekend, and meanwhile Luna is home at CatSynth HQ in California. I thought it would be appropriate to share some photos taken during some previous trips by our pet sitter Ronni West:

It's great getting to see these photos from Ronni, knowing that Luna is happy and being herself. Here we see her kneading some laundry left on the bed, which remains one of her guilty pleasures:

I make sure to leave some laundry out when I go away, I think it gives her a sense of familiarity and comfort.

Even though I do enjoy travelling, it's always great to come home and be reunited.

Weekend Cat Blogging #121 is being hosted this weekend at masak-masak.

The Bad Kitty Cat Festival of Chaos is going on the Mind of Mog. The theme this week is catnip, and while I know Luna is getting to enjoy fresh catnip during my absense, I don't have the photographic evidence on hand (yet).

The Carnival of the Cats will be hosted this week at Life from a Cat's perspective. And of course the Friday Ark #158 is at the modulator.

Finally, thank you to everyone who sent their kind thoughts this week, through comments here at CatSynth as well as via email or other media. I will try my best to answer individually as well, but wanted to say something here for everyone.

Weekend Cat Blogging: Beds, Pillows and Rain(?)

As usual these days, we are consolidating our weekend cat blogging activities. Weekend Cat Blogging is being hosted by Kate and Puddy (one of Luna's look-a-likes) at A Byootaful Life.
This weekend's theme for the Bad Kitty Chaos Festival, hosted by Pets Garden Blog, is pillows and beds. Well, soft cushions are one of Luna's areas of great expertise:

Of course we have seen her curled up on the bed many times:

And it is one of those days where curling up on a bed or a cushion seems like the perfect thing to do, with a steady cold rain coming down around us:

That wouldn't be much of a problem, except that we have an outdoor music festival tonight! September is the usually the hottest, driest month here, so something is wrong…

In addition to WCB and the Festival of Chaos, we also have the Carnival of the Cats, hosted this week by This That and the Other Thing, with Amber, Kosmo, Mouse and Indigo (another fellow black cat). And of course, the Friday Ark at themodulator.

Always time for Weekend Cat Blogging

Even in the midst of an incredibly busy weekend, we at CatSynth always try and find a few minutes for Weekend Cat Blogging:

Regular readers know that Luna is quite fond of towels, resting upon them, kneading them, etc. She has taken over this green towel which I left for her one day on the bed, and it has become a great spot for those all important afternoon naps/meditations.

Yes, being unemployed seems to leave me more busy than I was before, and this weekend is no exception, with several upcoming shows, and major and software projects with looming deadlines (but which I can't talk to you about), revamping my main artist/professional website, and a lot of time on the phone in touch with friends, colleagues and others. But one of the best parts of this period has been spending lots of quality time with Luna, even if just for an hour here and there in between other events, or having her around while I work online or in the studio.

Weekend Cat Blogging is being hosted by Megan and the Bad Kitty Cats. It seems that their site is down while recoving from hackers. Very rude and incovenient, those pesky hackers. We hope they're back up soon.

Carnival of the Cats will be at the House of the (Mostly) Black Cats this weekend.

The Bad Kitty Cat Festival of Chaos #10 is being held at the *New* Tuxedo Gang Hideout. They have a great graphic to go with it, reproduced below:

And of course, Friday Ark #156 is at the modulator.

Chaos Festival: "Aquatic" Luna

We couldn't let this week's theme for the Bad Kitty Cat Chaos Festival (hosted by Kashim and Othello) go unanswered. The theme is “water or rain.” Did somebody say “Aquatic”?

Indeed, the CD does have an underlying water theme, and can be very relaxing to listen to, according to many who have either purchased or downloaded it. Although several of the order pieces had an aquatic sound to them (e.g., “Proportional Fish”), the idea to use it as a unifying element was largely inspired by living here by the ocean…

Of course, all this talk about water makes us at CatSynth quite thirsty:






Weekend Cat Blogging #118 and more: Luna in Late Summer, Strays and Project Purr

We begin our Weekend Cat Blogging with Luna, in a photo taken last weekend:

Late summer (August and September) has a particularly quality of light I have always enjoyed, both clear and melancholy. I am particularly fond of this photo of Luna, not only does the light work great on her, but also the texture/geometry of the shadows from the blinds adds a stark, modernist touch.

Plus, the way Luna's expression complements the fish? Priceless.

I continue to see cats quite often in this one triangular vacant lot, not too far CatSynth HQ. Here is a grey cat I saw the other day :

I often see them stalking and hunting in the grass in this lot, which is bounded by a shopping center, a residential street and train tracks. The tracks have a nice walking path alongside, which I often use.

We previously featured a stray cat spending time in this lot in June.

In that same article from June, we mentioned the semi-annual rummage sale held by Project Purr, a local “cat rescue organization dedicated to FERAL cats and kittens.” The end-of-summer edition of their sale is this weekend. This time, we at CatSynth were prepared and donated some useless junk “quality household goods” for the sale. And bought some books. While I am primarily looking to reduce the amount of stuff here at CatSynth HQ, there is always room for more books.

Don't forget to check out all the other cats, domestic and outdoor, at What Did you Eat, where our friends Sher and Upsie are hosting.

The Bad Kitty Cats Festival of Chaos is being hosted by the “catboys” Kashim and Othello. Seems like they have been busy of late.

Carnival of the Cats is at Mind of Mog, and of course Friday Ark #155 is hosted by the modulator.





Weekend Cat Events: Cats of New Orleans Revisited

We at CatSynth will continue to keep this candle lit along with Kashim and Othello and all our cat-blogging friends. Please visit them for the full list of remembrances.

This week also marked the 2nd anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. On Wednesday, we revisited my trip to New Orleans last November. I also wrote about the Cats of New Orleans, both real and imagined, and so we re-visit them this weekend.


(Click to enlarge)

We also visited with the Louisiana SPCA and got a tour of their cat facilities in their temporary home, several environmentally controlled units inside a large warehouse. You can see some photos from the temporary SPCA as well. The good news is that they have completed and opened their new permanent facility. So much of the rebuilding in New Orleans has been slow or non-existent, it's good to see this success…

In addition to the Weekend of Rememberance by Kashim and Othello, the other weekend cat events are going on. Bad Kitty Cats Chaos Festival #8 as at The Mad Mirror. The Friday Ark #154 is at The Modulator. And Carnival of the Cats will be at This Blog is Full of Crap with Laurence et al.

Weekend Cat Blogging #116: Luna in stained glass 2007

For the past three summers, I have photographed Luna basking in the glow of the morning light through our stained-glass window. You can see her previous photos here, from 2005 and 2006. Her new stained-glass photos are below:


These were actually taken on separate days, one in July and one in August, which demonstrates not only Luna's fondness for this spot of colored light, but her photogenic nature. I am very proud of her in these photos.

Weekend Cat Blogging #116 is being hosted by our friends at Belly Timber. I really like the new graphics.

The Bad Kitty Cat festival of Chaos will be held by Pet and the Bengal Brats at Pet's Garden Blog.

The venerable Carnival of the Cats will be hosted at The Scratching Post. I like this “busniess case for kindness” thing…

And of course Friday Ark #153 will be where it always is, at The Modulator.






Bad Kitty Chaos Festival #4: The Round up

&cWell, it's Sunday afternoon and time for the round-up of the Bad Kitty Chaos Festival #4. The theme is Music and Cats, and Luna starts us off with a “CatSynth pose” next to a soon-to-be-bent Casio SK-10:

Meanwhile, Willow from sammawow has her own keyboard shot, where she channels the Ramones. Gotta love those 70s haircuts. We will probably feature some more photos of Willow as part of our regular “CatSynth pic” series.

Luna doesn't really play much, she mostly just likes to hang in the studio, as we've seen many times in the past:

For Gree, music is about purrrs. Purrs can indeed be a wonderful musical sound, there are several electronic treatments of purrs in the album I am currently working on entitled 2 1/2.

Next we take a little detour from art towards science. Living the Scientific Life asks the question “Can Animals Predict Impending Death?”, and features the much discussed case of Oscar who seemed to predict when residents at a nursing home were near death.

Oscar is also the subject of this week's contribution by TherapyDoc.

More music (or “mewsic”) can be found at the home of Kashim and Othello, where the boys try their own version of a faux reggae classic.

Meanwhile Victor Tabbycat presents Fursday along with Bonnie Underfoot.

Those Bengals are back, with all the Bengal cuteness, over at Pet's Garden Blog.

Mouse takes on the competition in this slideshow at This, That and The Other Thing (who hosted Carnival of the Cats last weekend). Don't worry Mouse, the toys are no match for you.

“When you?ve gotten bored of attacking your toys, there?s always your own foot to play with…”, as we are reminded at Dophin's Dock. Sage advice.

Have you ever considered a cat's whistkers? Well, you should. And this contribution from the Magick Cat Cauldron will help introduce you this amazing piece of feline machinery.

Samantha says thank you to everyone who helped with her surprise party. Sounds like it was a smashing success.

At Self Help for Cats, Herman Panther likes to sleep cuddled with his humans, “like a lover.” Reminds me of a bit of “kitty live” with our own little panther here, who loves to snuggle up in bed on my left side and fall asleep purring.

Aloysius joins our cats-and-music theme with his epic poem. Sing, Great Cat, the tale of Aloysius, mighty hunter of the line of Pangur Ban!.

Gemini sets off a bit of an argument at Chey's Place. Maybe time for her own blog? After all, there is no such thing as too many cat blogs.

Over at the Cat Realm, Karl dares us all with a challenge. Visit them to find out more. Oh, by the way, nice shades!


Finally, Biscuit has not come home, and Megan and bad kitty cats are losing hope that she will return. This is really sad news for our friends who started this “festival” – we hope that she does defy the odds and return, but our sympathies are with them now.

Thanks to everyone who participated in this week's Bad Kitty Cat Festival of Chaos. Next weekend, we'll be hosting the old favorite Weekend Cat Blogging.

Bad Kitty Chaos Festival #4

Luna and I welcome everyone to participate in Bad Kitty Chaos Festival, fourth edition. As Megan suggests, we are having an optional theme of Cats and Music:

To participate, you can [strinke] use the handy submission form, or leave us a comment right here on this post. We'll have the big roundup this Sunday!

UPDATE: Megan and the Bad Kitty Cats have another crisis on their hands. Biscuit is missing. We hope she is safe and comes home soon. In the meantime, please leave a comment instead of the submission form.

And lest we forget, it is also Weekend Cat Blogging #113 over at masak-masak, where Ms G the “elusive ginger kitty” hosts. Samantha and Tigger host this weekend's Carnival of the Cats; and of course the The Friday Ark is boarding at The Modulator.