Recording with cats

While typing this entry there is an adorably fuzzy cat trying as hard as she can to regain her position at the center of my universe by walking in front of the monitor and over the keyboard, her plume of a tail tickling my sensitive nose.  I love my two cats, Desmond and Molly, but this regular internet inteference is a striking example of a common theme: ordinary tasks take twice as long with two precocious felines about. This was brought home to me anew a couple of weeks ago when I decided to change my guitar strings. What had once been a routine task became an episode of "Tom and Jerry", with my twisting and turning guitar strings in the "jerry the mouse" role.  This weekend, I experienced the joys of recording in a home studio that is shared by two cats.  Desmond, the vocal one, felt the need to sing some strange and dissonant harmonies; Molly clearly believed that the microphone stand and the cable hanging from it were both new cat toys. A lot can go wrong in a recording session when there are no interruptions; adding cats to the mix is like -- well, like asking for cats to be literally added to the mix. So we began work on one song, "Girl on a String," and for the most part things went well. But don't be surprised if you play the final recording only to detect a plaintive and distinctive "meow" coming through in a verse or two.