Horoscopes for 2.18.2010

“When that I was and a little tiny boy,
With hey, ho, the wind and the rain;
A foolish thing was but a toy,
For the rain it raineth every day.”
Shakespeare’s Twelfth-Night; or, What You Will [V.i.350]

Fishing Guide to the Stars
by Kramer Wetzel
For the week starting: 2.18.2010

In Elizabethan England (Shakespeare’s era), the average work day was 12 hours long. That was just normal, back then. Labor intensive.

Pisces: Some days, here in Pisces land? Some days, it’s like this: I don’t know where I’m going but I do know where I’ve been.

As the Pisces Sun pulls up closer then lines up with Jupiter? There’s palpable excitement in Pisces. Despite what everyone else is saying and doing? You just know something good is about to happen.

Here’s a hint: make it happen.

Give the situation, the person the deal you’re waiting on? Give it a prod. Stick it. Poke it. Jostle it some. Make it happen by taking some kind of action.

Step forward. Step off. Leap. Jump and the parachute will appear? That’s where I sort of suggest that Pisces slow it down. I suggested action, but I suggested action based on the Pisces experience.

Take something you know about, take a topic that you’re intimately familiar with, and then take the appropriate next step. Simple planning will help. I’m suggesting you glance back, just once, to see where you’ve been. I’m not sure where that will lead you, but that’s the best place to start. That coming Jupiter alignment is just ever so much fun.

Aries: The Sun’s in Pisces, Mars is retrograde and you’re hungry. Saturn is also on the opposite side of the wheel. This introduces a kind of tension, like, in your neck. Sort of from one arm, up to the base of your Aries skull. It’s not really bad tension, it’s just, well, you can feel it there.

Yoga came into vogue and the underpinning process in yoga works well for Aries. Stretching, loosening up, and breathing exercises are what would be best. Something to keep your mind off that tension you’ve been sensing. To me, that tension is nothing more than a distracting kind of ache resulting from planet influences.

You’d argue that with me, but I’m not prepared to go against an Aries.

The way to release that tension? Stretching and breathing.

In with fresh, new, good air, then collapse and exhale the bad stuff. Feel that muscle ache and pain gradually being exhaled. This won’t be a permanent situation, either the tension or the breathing and stretching But as this week progresses? The way to let it go is to breath it out. Your “planet,” Mars, is still backwards, and that’s just making all of this a little more hesitant. Breath and release. Stretch.

Taurus: There’s a Mexican market not far from home. I wandered over there, it was a warm winter’s day, a hazy shade of winter? I wandered into the market place, and after meandering around, the only item that really caught my attention was lemonade.

I’m pretty sure this is an ethnic thing, too. The lemonade is made up in 5-gallon clear glass jar. Rounded and slightly barrel-shaped, with a metal dipper, and the sliced citrus in varying stages of decay. Waterlogged from an afternoon in the soupy mix. Part sugar, part sliced lemons, part I-don’t-know-what. It’s the secret ingredient that makes all the difference.

If it was me? I’d add a touch of molasses or maybe honey and then, just dab of cayenne pepper. Like an accent mark. Bite and flavor without too much bite or too much flavor. Don’t want to overdo the senses. I got a big glass, paper cup, full of the lemonade, sipped it on the way home. I’ve done this before so I know how to stretch out the flavor, and I’ve never been able to isolate just what that secret ingredient really is.

I’m thinking it’s a pepper of some kind. When I asked, the guy just shrugged, “Limones y sugar.” He pronounced “sugar” in English. Yeah, he’s not telling.

There’s a Taurus secret ingredient. Don’t reveal it. Sometimes, the mystery just adds to the allure.

Gemini: I was one of the first video bloggers to offer my “vlog” in true, high-definition video. Lasted one (1) episode. Took too much time to spin it up and spit it out. Not the content of the video but the time it took my little laptop to turn the images into true, wide-body, high-definition video.

Then, that exported format? The wide one? Extra long? It’s not extra lean, that’s for sure. Almost choked my uplink, the way I get that stuff uploaded to the server. Too long, too big, basically, too much information. Then, too, there was the format issue. Again more of an issue than it’s worth. I went back to normal-sized video.

At least, for now, it’s more standard and more portable, and easier for me to work with, limits of my technology and all. The file size is more manageable. Archives and all that? Yeah, just easier. The format issue, that too, I don’t even want to get into the file types debate. Players and all that stuff.

I never did my Flash Media player, so I’m stuck with what works. Which is also an idea for your Gemini self. It’s a great idea to embark upon a journey that might lead to technical improvements. However, is newer, bigger, faster, larger, more time-consuming, is all that really better?

Cancer: I looked at the Cancer’s chart, then looked away. Daydreamed a bit. I glanced back. I started counting water signs and planet symbols, and the location of a certain asteroid, and then, I had one of those daydream-like experiences. I was on a swing, in a park, near where I was raised. I couldn’t be more than 5 or 6 years old at the time.

I remember the swing set, and how high we could go. The action of a swing is like that of a pendulum, only the swing, in the case of my daydream sepia-tinged vignette? My little legs were powering that swing. A pendulum just gets by with a nudge and eventually, the pendulum stops. The swing, though, it can keep going as long as we want to power it. The swing, with it’s inherent pendulum physics, that’s what Cancer is like.

It’s good. Not so much. Now it’s good. Now it’s not. Swinging back and forth? You’ll stay in motion as long as you let yourself keep moving. Entropy means there will be eventual energy decay. But you can keep swinging all week long, if you so desire. Back and forth — good then bad. Then good again.

Leo: One place I lived, there was a little U-turn that was great fun on a fast motorcycle. The corner itself was clean concrete, affording an excellent grip for a street bike’s tires. From a car, it just looked like a sharp corner, but on motorcycle, it was a challenging decreasing radius, off camber corner with sticky pavement. Concrete, really, but it was good stuff.

Come off the stop sign, nail the accelerator, and lean into the corner. Hitting that corner blind would be a hazard, since it sharpened up in the blind spot. However, if I knew it was like that? I could anticipate and sail through there at three or four times the posted speed limit. I didn’t say this was bright choice, maybe not a stellar moment.

I did eat it in that corner once. Didn’t hurt me, but I was much younger and lot dumber. It’s fun if you know what’s up ahead. If you don’t know that it’s an off-camber, decreasing radius corner with median on the far side? That could very well upset the mighty Leo.

It’s possible, with practice and familiarity, to negotiate the twists and turns Mars will throw your way. However, I would suggest that you rehearse at a slower speed, a time or two, before you try and follow me into just such a corner.

Virgo: There are items under this sun, that maybe we would all rather not have to deal with. I saw just such a label in a local grocery store: Egg Salad Chili. I’m unsure if it was a combination of egg salad and chili, or chili with egg salad, like, on top or something.

I have had TexMex food served “New Mexico style” with a fried egg on top, but as the first meal of the day, it kind of fits. Maybe not, but that’s not what this was about. It was about a label that I declined to investigate any further.

I’m a pretty adventuresome individual when it comes to food. I don’t ask what animal it came from, much less what part of the animal it is. If it tastes good, I tend to enjoy it at the time, and not worry about consequences. That doesn’t mean I was about investigate that one label any further.

There’s one Virgo who will read this and be shocked I was disinclined to taste. In general, though, think, I mean, as a Virgo, does that label even sound inviting? Egg Salad Chili.

There’s a name, a label, a product description, a moniker, and whatever it’s describing? You want to pass? I’m with you.

This is a good time to skip the thing that doesn’t sound appealing.

For whatever reason.

Libra: When I think of Libra, I always think of a “visual medium,” in that, I always figure that what motivates a Libra is primarily visual stimulation. Male or female, “Oh pretty things, shiny object….”

My guess is that’s usually the best bait for Libra. The more I analyzed the chart, the more I came up with a different idea.

Most fish are visual, too, at least most of the Black Bass I’v fished for. Redfish, too, they have better eyes that humans, for sure. Better eyesight. These are not normal times, not for Libra. One of the tools in my tackle box is crank bait that has little ball bearings inside it. Rattles. Rattle-Trap is the trade name.

While normally trying to appeal to the Libra visual senses? As this week flies by? Consider that the noise, that tell-tale rattle? Like from my lure? That’s what works best. Think differently.

Scorpio: Buddy of mine, he’s been complaining about a sore back. He finally got around to seeing a bone cruncher who referred my buddy to real specialist who then prescribed some hard drugs. Must be really good “pain management” pills. I’m not sure what it was, but he was stoned.

He called me up and was just chatting away, and I don’t think he realized how stoned he was. The good news was he was on his ranch. The better news was he wasn’t going to operate any heavy equipment. He’s starting to look at summer hay. I’ll promise, in his current condition, he won’t be operating a bailer or combine, or even his pickup. At least I hope not. Pain medication does have its place.

As a Scorpio, your back’s been hurting, too. I’ll just warn you about whatever you choose to help with that pain? Be careful. When the instructions say, “Don’t operate heavy equipment?” It’s for real. Don’t. Not a challenge, either, just a suggestion.

Sagittarius: I’m at that point in life where I listen to what the doctor recommends and I follow the advice. Well, I follow most of the advice. I haven’t cut back on coffee as I should, but then there are certain pleasures that seem like necessities to me. I was gobbling the morning dose of vitamins. Flax Seed, Fish Oil, Vegetable Oil, the medley of alphabet enumerated pills, A, C, E &c. I fished a “pop tart like breakfast pastry” out of the toaster oven.

I looked at it. There was the sad taste of vitamins in the back of my throat. I looked down and momentarily sucked in my gut. A bite of the toaster pastry eased the medicine flavor. Swig of coffee to wash it all down. Sort of normal routine, in cold February mornings, predawn light in the kitchen.

As the sun enters Pisces, and in the coming weeks, as the Sun aligns with Jupiter, there’s a spark. Jupiter in Pisces can be good, played correctly. As a Sagittarius, though, there’s a good chance we play this all wrong. That’s what I’m trying to guard against. I’m not sure if you’re taking all the pills that I am. I’m not sure if you’re having a toaster pastry of some ilk. There’s a spark, though a point of ignition that occurs at the precise moment when the Sun and Jupiter align. All that preparation? It’s got to be for something.

Capricorn: I was in a discount western store. It’s a place that sells cowboy boots, jeans, shirts, and any other kind of cowboy accouterment. Discount is a loose term, in the grand scheme of things, but for the time being, since this one store was in an “outlet mall,” sure, let’s say it was a discount place.

I got into a grammar question with one of the kids working there. He wanted to know why a he couldn’t just use a comma to join two independent clauses. Grammar cops. In this case, the grammar cop was me, jeans and boots, that day, and a (faux) pearl snap shirt. There’s a kind of oversized bandana that I like to use as a “dew-rag.” I’ve only ever found those extra-large bandanas at the cowboy store.

That I looked and sounded like a local was pure happenstance. I quoted the epic reference, The Elements of Style, to illustrate the correct grammar answer. I do believe I stopped them in their tracks, if only for a moment. Anyone who’s read any of my material knows that I can dangle a modifier and incorrectly punctuate the sentences with the best of them.

Just because I know the rules — that doesn’t mean they apply to me. As a mighty Capricorn, this next few days? Like me, you can break all the rules, but you have to know the rules, first. Know what rules you’re breaking, okay?

Aquarius: I watch for sale items and I keep sort of mental check list of material I might need. Like fishing hooks. A very simple, sometimes inexpensive, piece of equipment. Sharp hooks are important. The right size, shape, color, all of that figures into the hook selection process. I was in a big super store, sells hardware, grocery items and so on. On the fishing row, I was looking for a special kind of fishing pole, didn’t find the pole, but I did find hooks.

Worm hooks, on sale, good brand, laser-sharp, red-anodized, perfect. Sale. Half price. I dug through the little sale rack and got as many of those packages of hooks as I could find. At the checkout counter, chili-fixins and fishing hooks. The checker raised an eyebrow but didn’t say a thing.

It’s not what you’re really looking for. It’s not in a likely place, either. It’s not anything that you can anticipate or expect. However, be ready because there are some good deals to be had, if you’re casual enough about looking. Making the deal, too, I watched while the checker scanned the items. If those hooks hadn’t been on sale, I wouldn’t have bought them. Who can afford hooks that are, like about a dollar apiece, normally?