“I know a bank whereon the wild thyme blows,
Where oxlips and the nodding violet grows
Quite over-canopied with luscious woodbine,
With sweet musk-rose, and wild eglantine.”
Shakespeare’s A Midsummer-Night’s Dream [II.i.259-62]
Venus joins Mars and Saturn in Libra. Dark Moon in Leo.
Leo: “Everything is bigger in Texas.” It is. We have more usable land mass than any other state and if we were to secede, we’d be one of the largest oil-producing countries in the world. Along with our sizable resources, and along with our claim that everything is bigger, like the T-shirt said, we have larger egos than any other state. Larger pride, too. Which is why that was a perfect shirt for what’s happening in Leo.
Leo is the best of the best, that’s not the question but like that shirt said? Everything is bigger? That also means that egos and its little buddy pride? That gets larger too, which is a problem. It’s okay the let everyone else talk about how you’re greater.
It’s not a good week to be bragging yourself. Or bragging about yourself. You may be better, like here in Texas, we’re bigger? But just because you’re better doesn’t mean you should revel in that. So my first suggestion is to leave the “Everything is bigger in Texas” t-shirt at home. The second point? Maybe don’t be rubbing our collective noses in the fact that you are The Leo, and therefore, better.
Virgo: I’ve linked and photographed the t-shirt, more than once. Used it one year as a greeting for Austin’s SXSW ugly crowds.
The shirt’s front has, in large letters, “Tu eres un pendejo.” Underneath, in smaller print, or brackets, or something, it is translated, “You are my friend.” That’s not the literal translation. Which is what makes it funny. Funnier.
Even my friends who don’t speak much Spanish, much less the border patois we get here in Texas? The message is clearly something that is different from the proffered translation.
If you’re in Texas, or anywhere in the American Southwest, I’m sure you’re familiar with the expression or, at least salient portions of the expression. Not familiar with it? Don’t ask. It’s not polite. I mean, it’s polite to ask, it’s just the answer might not be polite. Hence the problem.
As your week winds up or winds down, or basically unravels? Be wary of fraudulent translation, and be wary of primary sources that aren’t so primary as more satirical in nature. I’m not saying that someone will out and out lie to you this week, but I’d double check some of the facts.
Libra: I haven’t seen this t-shirt in years. Maybe decades, although I’m sure as soon as I print that comment, someone will shoot me a current image of just such an item.
“I’m with stupid,” reads one t-shirt, and it’s companion, the shirt’s companion? “I’m stupid.”
I’ll guess, judging by the arrow on the front, the guy is supposed to walk on the right side. It’s scary, in its own way. This speaks to a depth of pathology not witnessed before. Just very scary. Maybe it’s because “stupid” got fed up with being referred to as such. There’s a corollary that accompanies this, and that’s the “couples” shirts. His and hers. Hers and his?
Both wearing the same shirt. Same color, same design, identical. Sort of shouts, “We’re together.” Not all that bad, but then, there are times when this isn’t something one wants announced. Not emblazoned on the front of a t-shirt. This is one of the times you don’t want to wear the “I’m stupid” shirt. Or the other one, with the arrow. Neither is attractive. With the planets where they are? Strive to be original. Not “with” someone.
Scorpio: I have yet to figure out how to address this particular point. I was grabbing a cup of caffeine in the afternoon, really, just getting some ice tea. It’s summer and it’s hot. I’ll refill that cup with ice and homemade ice tea several times in the afternoon, but while I was out, it was just something I needed.
The child — to me — behind the counter, couldn’t be much more than 16 or 20 years old, certainly not old enough to legally drink alcohol, that kid was wearing a Pink Floyd shirt. Granted, Pink Floyd is one of the greatest and most innovative musical groups in recent history, but still.
The band quite playing gigs and started to die off long before that kid was ever born. Not the only time I’ve seen this kind of anomaly. A youngster was a wearing a Sex Pistols shirt one afternoon. Same deal. Band was gone before the kid wearing the shirt was conceived. The original art on the T-shirts, and I’ve seen variation on this repeated over and over, but the idea is that the artwork on the t-shirt itself lives on.
Scorpio, what will live on? Is that really the message you want to leave behind?
Sagittarius: For a while, I sold the best stealth T-shirt design ever. It was a basic black T-shirt. On the front and the back, in white bold stencil print, it had a simple word. Single word. “Security.” All it said. Maybe I had a logo or my web site’s URL but the part that stood out in the design? That single word. That works better than just about anything else as a way to bluff past the “security” at various events.
For many years, I just used the standard line, “I’m in the band.” Then the security t-shirt. Either one works. It’s also possible to manufacture your own “security” t-shirt. Just gets some stencils and can of white spray paint. Black t-shirt. Good to go.
With times being what they are? We need some kind of break. Since we’re not getting a break these days, what we have to do is manufacture a break. Like that t-shirt. Are we really posing as security? Us? Sagittarius? Hardly. That’s not the question. It’s how we can get ourselves a little break. I like the t-shirt idea. No label, no claims, nothing illegal. It’s all about how you bluff.
Capricorn: I’ve written about this before, but it came up again. I was with a buddy of mine, a thoroughly Irish Texan. Irish first name, Irish last name, drinks like an Irishman, drinks Irish whiskey and Irish beer and the filter? Between his brain and mouth? Like a good drunken Irishman, that goes away when he drinks.
So we were in a bar on the south side of town, and there was a large, bigger than both of us, Latin gentleman with a simple T-shirt. Grey cotton (blend) with what were once bright green hems at the neck and sleeves, and a single word in green, trimmed with gold, on the front. “Irish.”
Those hems on the arms? Stretched taught by large muscles. Bigger than my legs. My pseudo Irish buddy, he is of direct Irish decent, he got a little labial about the “Big Mexican in the Irish T-shirt.” I didn’t want to try and back him up in fight, not my buddy, and I didn’t want trouble that would eventually involve police and a possible trip to ER. Probable. All over a single word on a T-shirt.
I know one former girlfriend, she was “Mexican Vanilla” in my thinking (and my pet name), since she was half Scotch-Irish, half Mexican (by her own words).
I wasn’t going to fight with the big guy about a slogan on a T-shirt. Are you? My buddy? That afternoon? If I hadn’t hustled him out of that bar? Might have said something offensive.
Aquarius: One time, with one of the “make your own t-shirt” website, I did a version of my own legalese (EULA, ToS, Privacy Policy &c.)
I did a computer graphic of all the rules and then had that material printed on a t-shirt. On the back. Biggest piece of T-shirt real-estate. Billboard size. A friend’s daughter got one of the shirts. Fetching young lass, expected proportions, and so on. She was a little upset, though, since the shirt was worn frequently for a period of time, the fine print on the back garnered the bulk of the attention. Not what my friend’s daughter wanted.
She wanted people interested in her front. Boys, in particular. She didn’t like the guys reading her back, not even admiring the view or nothing. Which is our problem.
What is the message you’re trying to send and what is the message that’s getting sent? Void where prohibited by law.
Pisces: One of my buddies had new T-shirt the other afternoon. The shirt showed a cartoon fish with a fin-grip on a small net. In the net was a caricature and cartoon fisherman. Appropriate message, who has who hooked?
Short caricature. Life imitates art, and in this example, some would find it bad art, but art, nonetheless. It refers to the central problem and point with what is going on in the Pisces arena, just who is driving? Who is in charge? Or what, in some situations. There’s a kind of carefree abandon, and adopting that kind of attitude will go a long way in making life better. Maybe not better, but easier for Pisces.
There’s a sense that there needs to be something accomplished, only, the harder you try to reach that goal? The more you work towards landing that big fish in a net? The more likely you wind up just like the fisherman on the front of my buddy’s t-shirt.
Aries: T-shirt I’ve seen here, a lot? “I am Mexican. Not Latin, not Hispanic, Latin is from Italy, Hispanic is from Hispanola.” Variation on theme. Same message, usually an Emlio Zapata caricature growling the message, or glaring, at the very least.
Think I’ve got pictures of this one t-shirt, someplace. There’s another shirt, sold alongside it, equally amusing, to me, “Hey Gringo be all you can be, ride with Pancho Villa’s Army!” No self-respecting Mexican calls us a gringo. I might be called many things, a pale, skinny white kid, but not “gringo.”
Means that the t-shirt was made by a gringo. Not a Mexican. Border patois is the clue.
I’m using t-shirt slogans as a warning, but I’m also urging you to look a little deeper than the surface. Like I suggested, no Mexican uses the term gringo. Does this really matter? With Uranus and Jupiter on your doorstep, opposed by Mars/Venus/Saturn? Yes, it matters. Dig. Dig deeper. Get the facts.
Taurus: When I was last in the San Antonio market place, there was this great tourist t-shirt that evoked local pride. “I’ve got two favorite (basketball) teams: Los Spurs and whoever is playing Dallas.”
Speaks to a sentiment that is prevalent in that South Texas town, San Antonio. The Spurs, the local NBA franchise, it’s less of a sports team and lot more of a religion. So it would seem. Then, there’s the added rivalry with the Dallas team, a vocal and well-managed franchise.
It’s the I-35 battle, since one town is at one end of Interstate 35, and the other straddles the other end. I’ll keep my loyalties to myself, as I don’t want to offend fans from either stripe. However, that was a very amusing shirt as it captured so much in so little.
It’s one of those San Antonio/South Texas things. I’d like to suggest, too, for Taurus: Rather than just rooting for the home group, Team Taurus? Or whatever affiliation there is? There are two groups to cheer for, the home team, and whoever is playing the arch rival. Like the t-shirt suggested.
Gemini: We’ve all seen them. “My (Sister, brother, father, mother, friend) went to (tourist trap, exotic destination, around the corner from here) and all I got was this T-shirt.” You probably received just such a shirt in the past year. I thank the person for the shirt and send it off to the donation stack immediately. I don’t hold onto such items. I’m pretty much opposed to advertising for anyone on my clothing unless it’s a very specific brand, like my own, or if I’m getting paid to do it.
I’m not opposed to such items, but there’s a level of thoughtlessness that seems to be inflicted by just such a choice. It’s especially painful when it’s a destination that I would love to see for myself, just getting me the t-shirt?
Only irritates the wound — the fact that I didn’t go?
Only makes it worse.
As a Gemini, there are two sides of this to think about. The first is giving someone one of those shirts. How thoughtful is that? It’s not. The second point to consider, though, if someone, other than me, gives you one of those shirts? Be gracious. Be kind Don’t snap. Even though it might be a little irritating that the other person went instead of your Gemini selves? Don’t freak and be ungracious.
Cancer: It was a simple design. The front of the T-shirt had a simple image, and since it was a white t-shirt, the only color was the red stripe and blue field with a single word underneath the image. The image itself was the Lone Star, the State of Texas Flag. Underneath it, a single word appeared: “Home.”
Sends a strong message about place. And this isn’t about where you were born, or where I was born, none of that. This isn’t about Texist pride (and arrogance), this is about sending a simple and effective message.
Simple packaging, and the way the design incorporated the image of the flag, white t-shirt, white background of the flag, just simple images laced together by a theme. Simple and effective theme. The flag, it’s almost universally recognized, the state that was a country before it was a state, and then, the simple word, and even though it’s in English, it would be understandable in most language that use the Roman alphabet. Maybe some that don’t, as well. Simple and effective with a minimalist approach.
