For the week starting: 9.16.2010

“What is the city but the people?”
Shakespeare’s Coriolanus [III.i.244]

Virgo: Like a satellite, there’s a warehouse district just shy of downtown. I was walking past one place — I think they make or sell cabinets — two kittens came tumbling out the door, exploring the loading dock. Cutest thing in the world, for the moment those kittens. A very tired, kind of haggard-looking Siamese mom cat slunk over and supervised while the two children played.

One of, the kittens was clearly not Siamese and given the location, I doubt that the mom cat was purebred, other than a good mouse chaser. I paused, reached for my phone to take a picture or two of cat and kittens at play. The kittens were tentatively exploring the loading dock. There was a loud crash in the warehouse, and the two kittens, hair on end in a comical fashion, scurried back inside, legs and paws akimbo.

The mom cat arched her back, to stretch, her swollen teats swinging. She ambled back inside. The kittens, that playful kind of tumble out the door? That tentative exploration? That’s what Virgo looks like to me. Or should look like.

There’s a cautious sense of adventure, a need to explore what some of the outer reaches might contain. However, like the kittens, if there is that loud, or otherwise scary, noise, or incident? Don’t hesitate to scurry back inside where your Virgo self is safe.

Libra: Next Tuesday, Wednesday, Libra starts. Fall Equinox. Supposedly, although, around here? I’d be hard pressed to prove this, but supposedly, the amount of day and night is equal at this time. Also means that summer is allegedly over. Not so much. Not around here. However, I’m not really prepared to discuss local weather conditions.

The people who experience earthquakes laugh at those of us who suffer with hurricanes and those with hurricanes laugh at ones with tornados and then, like me and our year-round “summer,” we are perturbed by those with that frozen precipitation, and this becomes a vicious cycle of “mine is better than yours,” or, in some cases, “my misery is more acute than yours,” and to be fair? That’s not a good way to compare.

Your birthdays are coming, and you’re getting cozy with Mr. Saturn. Saturn is, not to equivocate, exasperating, at times. Can’t help that. He’s mean, and he’s here to “learn” you a few things. Add to the question the relative placement of a bevy of other planets, and I’d wonder if the message was about getting by with a little less luxury but still seeing some improvement in your quality of life. Less is sometimes more.

Scorpio: Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet is perhaps the best example of how this week works. Or how it doesn’t work. Or what you can do to avoid the tragic ending.

No, seriously, there’s been more than one version of the play, once as an opera, where the script’s been edited to a have a happy ending. In the play itself, the two title characters don’t really get much time together. Way it works out, they spend all their days and nights pining away for each other, but not much time together. From what I know about girlfriends, face time is important. From what I know about Scorpio, what with the planets Mars and Venus in your sign? Like star-crossed lovers? You’re all kinds of worked up. Like that play. You’re all kinds of worked up over — what was her name? Rosaline? Oh, now it’s Juliet. Shakespeare’s play opens with the title character bemoaning his love — Rosaline. Typical kid.

Now, in the play, Romeo and Juliet aren’t afforded much face time, at least, not while alive. Think about that. Think about Mars and Venus in Scorpio. Pressure is on. How will you handle it? I’d not follow the script, if that’s possible and I’d start working on getting face time. Keep away from tragic endings.

Sagittarius: I was up rather early the other morning. I stepped outside. It felt, to me, deliciously cool. Like there was fall in the air. A neighbor’s door was open and leaking AC. Cold air, that was why it felt so wonderful, for a glorious moment.

The warm, wet wool of summer enveloped me again, shortly thereafter. Our “fall” doesn’t start until, maybe, like, I’m guessing, Thanksgiving? Later than that? Like January? I’ve got one friend from up north who laments the lack of seasons in Texas, and I happily point out, there are distinct seasons here, just the distinctions are more subtle.

This isn’t about local weather, though, it’s about Sagittarius perceptions. In the next few days, thanks to Mars and Venus, we’re going to get ourselves fooled at least once, maybe more. Get worked up? It is an obvious mistake. Besides, Mars and Venus, as they precede us? They’re intent on a little subtle subterfuge at our Sagittarius expense.

It could be something as simple as me mistaking cool air for an atmospheric change. That’s not bad. Announcing that perception? That’s when I start to look a little goofy. I don’t need any help in looking goofy. Neither do you. Maybe, even though we detect changes? Maybe not announcing it might be best.

Capricorn: It’s all about moving, like moving from one domicile to another. I’ve previously alluded to this, but this time, it was funny. Very amusing. The moving crew, the guy running the show, he looked like a roady. Been in the business of moving large, heavy material from one place to another, for what seemed like a long time.

Road dogs are road dogs, what we are. The road leaves its mark on your soul, and some of us can recognize each other. So it was like that, only, he was now moving houses. Domiciles. People and their stuff. He unloaded my friend’s place, almost entirely. All that was left on the truck? The Big Screen TV and the mattress. “Time to settle our bill,” the roady announced. “But you’re not done,” I observed. “Yeah, I’ve found that it moves faster if we’re paid before the last load in,” he replied.

Clever. Old road dogs, they do know the tricks. He tallied a bill, my buddy paid, and the new place we set up. I took my leave, chuckling. Pretty good trick. Excellent end-game gambit, if you ask me. Is this important? You did have an end-game gambit, perhaps similar, planned, didn’t you? I warned you to think about this stuff.

Aquarius: As Mars and Venus are getting cozy together in Scorpio, I was thinking about a particular Marcus Aurelius quote. I used it in the web journal a few days back. Maybe further back than that, but doesn’t matter. I grabbed another copy of the same text, different translation, and I looked up the quote.

Substantially different in texture. The meaning under a strict structural analysis, that would be the same, as I was looking for a better way to say, “Don’t fight city hall,” or “Don’t argue with fixed objects that lie in your pathway,” or similar kind of admonishment.

The quote, and now I’ve looked this up in three different editions, it varies as to tone, but the substance is still the same. I carry one copy of Marcus Aurelius Meditations in my day bag. Another in my overnight bag. Then, there’s a classical translation, rather dated, sitting on my desk. I was looking at Book V, chapter 17. Very different tones to all three versions. Still, the message is the same, “Don’t argue with fixed objects.” Like Mars and Venus, in Scorpio at this moment. Just goes nowhere fast.

Pisces: Really happened. I was driving a girlfriend’s car. Coming back from a little road trip together, I asked if she had an aspirin in her voluminous purse. Of course she did. She popped open one of those little pill containers with a couple of enameled slots. She handed me two white tablets, and I choked them down. Kind of bitter, more bitter than usual. Something about a bitter pill to swallow?

She looked at me for a second, then back at her pill box. “Kramer, I think you better let me drive.” The aspirin might have been a powerful migraine medicine. Or not. Couldn’t tell. I protested until she explained that usually only took a half when she was head to head with a debilitating headache, so me, taking two? Probably not a good time to operate heavy machinery. Or anything. Next exit, we swapped roles. She drove. About an hour into the trip home, I became animated and talkative.

There are two lessons for Pisces: don’t take drugs from strangers, and sometimes? Aspirin really is just aspirin. However, looking at the Pisces chart? You can’t be too careful, and I really recommend not following me when blindly accepting tablets from strange people. Or even people who might be a familiar, but you’re unsure of the contents? I’m just saying, in my case, it was okay. However, I am a professional.

Aries: Me? Morning coffee. I rounded a corner on a downtown street. Three, obviously hispanic, and obviously, having slept the fall evening on the street, guys. There’s a park nearby, could’ve been there. They looked at me with rummy eyes, one hoisted a can of inexpensive malted beverage, “Mag-um!”

He toasted me. He was also pretty toasted.

I do have a historically accurate “Magnum PI Hawaiian Print” shirt. Didn’t have it on that morning, though. I think it was, “Mag-um Pee Ay,” in a cheery tone of voice. Not malicious. Not sober, either, at, like 8 in the morning.

While I don’t advocate alcohol in the morning, in my time, I’ve found it to be beneficial. Like that one man out of the three. The other two weren’t as cheery. Might’ve been my shirt, too, but I kind of doubt that.

There are four players in this game. Me, the other three, of which one was cheery while two were less than happy. In the morning, each morning, for the next week, you get to make a very Aries choice. What’s going to be? I’d lift a beverage and toast the guy who looks like a TV star. Either that or beer for breakfast, it’s a choice. I’d toast me. Personally though, I do prefer coffee. But that’s just me. I was headed to a coffee shop that very morning.

Taurus: Bippus was a small township in Deaf Smith County, here in Texas. The area was originally populated about a hundred years ago, on land that once belonged to the legendary XIT Ranch.

The name of the village is from George Bippus who donated land for a school. The littlest things make the biggest difference, or so it seems. From a mere cross in the road, a true crossroads, there’s the legend, the stories, the half-truths, tall tales, and everything else that makes the myth work.

Then there’s the real history, too. Mars and Venus are moving into a position that is opposite you, and what you do with this energy, it could stick around for more than a hundred years. Which is why, as George did about this, it’s important to weight your (Taurus) choices carefully.

Gemini: North and east of downtown San Antonio, on the road to Austin, there’s a small township called “Universal City.” So named, because, apparently, its founding parental unit thought that there was a “Universal Appeal” to having an air strip nearby. At one end of Universal City? Randolph Air Force Base. I’ve sat outside a coffee shop, on a fall afternoon and watched while the planes, pilot training be my guess, would arrive in tight formation, landing, or doing touch and go training exercises. I’m not sure.

I’ve always marveled at the skill of the pilots, flying so close that the wing tips almost touch — moving in tandem harmony like that, and yet, staying out of each other’s way. How do they do it? I don’t know.

As a Gemini, though, you understand the ability to move two people as one, cohesive unit. You like the idea. I like the idea of many hours logged training.

As long as Mars and Venus are flying like a wingman for each other? Consider doubling up on the Gemini training exercises until those two give you a little distance The training exercises, in Gemini are good for you and this should last for about another ten days. Or so.

Cancer: I picked a quote from Shakespeare’s Coriolanus to open this week’s scopes. Meant something at the time, but what it really means? Means I wasn’t looking out for my little Cancer friends with that quote selection, I really should’ve borrowed something heavy and ominous from the Bard’s Scottish Play, as it’s referenced in the theater.

Heavy and dark, full of foreboding, warning of dire consequences. Some quote that suitably is theatrical enough to follow the meteoric fall from grace in that Scottish Play. When good goes bad and from bad to worse? Careful who you dance with, as you “must always dance with them that brung you.”

What happened in that play? The main character, looks like he will win everything? Then it’s a quick turn into madness, with the wife not far behind him. Ahead of him. Kind of a race in that play to see who’s going to get it first. They’re both crazy. Worth noting? Sure. Most of the action on stage takes place in darkness. Kind of a hint. While everyone else is worried about minute and minor problems, there’s a kicker to Cancer.

The point to a good scope, though is how to point you out of this. Don’t go for the darkness, the evil, and don’t give in to the temptation. The easy way out? It’s usually the not the easiest.

Shortcuts and witches prophesies? Usual end badly. I’m just saying, for Cancer? Full Moon and all? Darkness and the “dark side” are not your friend.

The Leo: Mars in a fixed sign is like a little irritant. Mars is in Scorpio now. Venus in another fixed sign is an irritant. Venus is in Scorpio right now. Two, relatively, minor players compared to the grand eloquence and stately majesty that is Leo, right?

Correct.

However, you know I’d have to throw that in, right? Well, see, loathe as I am to point this out, there’s a problem or two with the way things are. Two problems, the aforementioned planets in fixed signs. Bad? Hardly. Uncomfortable? To be sure. On one web journal I was running, I opened the comments up to the general public. The spam filter started to collect hundreds of clearly automated messages that were designed as some kind of advertising.

Why there’s a spam filter and why it works. If there was just an occasional block, that wouldn’t be noticeable. However, there was hundred-fold increase in crap. I was annoyed. Choices: shut down the comments, or just deal with the spam filter clogging up every few hours? Minor versus major. That’s Mars and Venus. Deal with it. It’s not a long-term problem.