Fishing Guide to the Stars starting 7.19.2012

“He is not quantity enough for that Worthy’s thumb.”
Shakespeare’s Love’s Labor’s Lost [V.i.126-7]

The Leo: Bacon, blueberry, chocolate yogurt smoothie? Sounds good, and if it’s those fake bacon bits? Low Cholesterol and heart healthy. I’m unsure of how that idea came up, I was thinking of elements that I like. I’m not big on chocolate, but I haven’t had a girlfriend yet who doesn’t like chocolate. One, but she’s an anomaly. Everything in that list of ingredients is healthy and tasty.

Why not throw them all in a blender and call it a meal? There are some days when the sum of the parts is not greater than the parts themselves. This is a week like that. Sure Mercury is currently Retrograde in Leo, but that’s not the end. Your birthday stuff starts soon. Enjoy it. There will be a few mistakes, but not all that bad. Ever hear about the guy who did “chicken-fried bacon“? That stuff was a hit, as was chocolate-dipped bacon. Got to try a few combinations to come up with a winner.

Virgo: “It’s, like, well,” the girl behind the counter looked me up and down, assessing and framing a pitch, “surf punk. Yeah, that’s what it is. Sort of Rock-a-Billy, you know.” I fingered a CD in bright plastic. The diminutive artwork on the cover depicted a garish cross between Betty Page and Elvira, with a weird country twang somehow figured in. I’m not sure how. Surf Punk? Hardly. Rock-a-Billy?

As much as anything. Band wasn’t even from the United States. Hard to claim Southern Roots from Northern Europe. Some of my friends saw this group play, last year on the Warped tour. With the fragmentation of modern music, it’s hard to pin a group down to a specific genre, but that was a case where the record store girl was trying to guess. I’d give her credit. Leo, actually, I asked. She was a Leo. Not Virgo. This is about making a guess to tailor your message to what you perceive the audience wants to hear. Guess. Might guess wrong, as she did, but even the wrong answer was right. Sold a CD, and I like the music. Call it what you want.

Libra: Menu at trendy new spot here in town? New menu, new place. The typeface was retro/modern. The font itself I recognize as ‘BauHaus 93.’ I’ve used that very font in some designs myself. Sort of echoes a time gone by and thoroughly modern chic at the same time. Also pretty useless. It’s great as a single world, or, like, as a plain URL. Like kramerw.com. But as a menu type, like a menu in a restaurant? I want to be able to read the contents and just trying to impress me with the “look” of the place doesn’t work. Some days, arty expression wins out over practical application. This isn’t a time to choose something that looks cool, but is, in the overall view, pretty useless. Function dictates form for Libra. Mars accentuates this, but you get the idea. Righty? Correct.

Scorpio: With Mars cooking along in Libra, the sign in front of you? This creates a certain amount of undue angst. Tension. This is compounded by Mars being opposite Uranus for part of the week. What this does, it sets up this “I want to do this, this, this and THIS. Right NOW!” Whoa, slow down there, big fella, whoa horsey…. That hurried nature results in nothing. Trying too many things, all at once results in nothing. Slow down. Take it easy. Stop and pick and choose.

Stop. Pick. Choose.

Then put the list in order. What’s most important? Can you do anything about it RIGHT NOW? No? Then move on to number two on the list. However, take all of thee items in order. Don’t jump around. Mercury makes your thinking unstable, and that Mars energy just adds a dose of “Hurry, hurry, HURRY! NOW!” That voice crying, “Must have it now”? Pay no attention. As long as Mercury is backwards none of this will happen on time. You can save the day, by taking these items one at time. “Wow, how did you get all that done, Scorpio?” One at a time. Slowly. Painfully slow. But one at a time.

Sagittarius: Let’s take a strictly hypothetical situation, like, I’ve got some extra cash in an envelope. On my desk. Or the kitchen counter. Someplace. Cash. Lots of it. Maybe a hundred. Maybe not quite that much, and you’ll have to adjust this idea as you see fit, whatever works for your Sagittarius self. In my example, strictly hypothetical, envelope, was addressed to me, and I folded over some extra cash, and I left that on the desk. Safe place. As safe as any. Who’s going to look in an envelope on my desk, right? Then the mail, and then, more mail, and bills keep stacking up, and then, more mail, and I lost that envelope. Wasn’t so much money that I would tear the place apart, but I did want a nice sandwich for lunch. Mercury is backwards. My money is missing. Not so much that I can shake a stick at a girlfriend, but there’s still the question of where it is, and I’m sure I put it in a safe place, only, it’s not in the usual places. Hence the problem. That’s what this Mercury Retrograde is about. Where’s the envelope with the pocket change in it?

Capricorn: I got in heated discussion with another ‘self-styled’ astrologer, about the problems associated with Mercury Retrograde. I refuse to buy all the dire predictions that some folks hand out. I do embrace the concept of caution, but that doesn’t mean I don’t suggest to hide under the bed. This particular Mercury falls in such a way as the make the retrograde pattern more problematic at the Capricorn place of work.

That’s my one warning. One warning. Not going to say it again. Not going to suggest that you learn to duck, while at work, so as to miss the crap that goes sailing by in the air. Not going to mention that the boss, if you even have a real boss, I’m not going to mention that the boss is going to come unhinged at you, this week, for something that you did — or didn’t — do, right, wrong, badly, or even at all. Not at all. One of those. Any of those. Most of this comes under the heading of “It’s not my fault,” or better yet, “it’s not my job.”

Doesn’t matter You were selected for this, long before you signed up for this lifetime. What you do with the impossible tasks, the unobtainable goals, and ultimate derision for your perceived lack of qualities? I suggest nothing. Just keep putting one foot in front of the other to get through this mess. In a few weeks, boss comes back and apologizes. Until then? Keep to yourself, and keep putting one foot in front of the other.

Aquarius: The story is more apocryphal than factual. Doesn’t stop me from using it. A certain airline I used to favor heavily, that company found a way to cut some corners. 4 (four) peanut halves were removed from the average bag of peanuts. Made a difference. 4 peanuts. Not that much, from a consumer point of view, but it does take two whole bags of the peanuts to be happy.

The flip side of this, look at it from business perspective, any savings, no matter how small on the individual scale, that savings multiplied over hundred, thousands, hundreds of thousands of peanut bags in a day? That can add to some serious jack. Coin. I’m not saying you have to make a drastic cut, but look at what four peanuts did for one company. Don’t believe me? Look it up on that inter-web thing. Four peanuts. Think about where to shave corners while Mercury is backwards yet.

Pisces: We get closer but not closer. There is some resolution, but not quite what your Pisces self really wants. I tend to believe that Pisces, as a whole, and in part, are normally immune to Mercury Retrograde. More or less. This is a “less” rather than more situation. There’s a planet punch that influences this Mercury Retrograde, not so much but sort of does. All the stuff in Gemini? Doubles the effect of the Mercury being backwards.

Normal Pisces teflon? Doesn’t deflect the fact there’s twice as much crap accumulating. You can only duck, dodge, weave, and avoid for so long, and then? You get caught with a pie, right in the face.

Here’s your warning: it’s going to happen, this week, probably. Here’s the way around it: carry a towel, all week long. You can use that towel to wipe the smirk off your face, the pie off your face, the egg off your face, whatever it is that gets you? You have way to remove the evidence, quickly and cleanly.

Aries: I’m no longer a car guy. Not much, anyway. Might be the decline in testosterone in my system, as I get older. Might be I learned a lot about a narrow range of make and models, and I never moved passed that. Could be that too many of the modern cars look like running shoes, only a lot less sporting. Part of my lack of interest might be I lived in a trailer in South Austin, and that trailer cost less than most cars do.

So I was picking up a rent car, and the girl behind the counter cheerily told me I would love it because it was a new Cilantro. “A Coriander?” The reference was lost. Honda, Toyota, Kia, one of those, they all look the same. “The new Cilantro!” I also misunderstood the name, but I was close. I found the car, but only because I had a key fob with a clicker, and the remote chirped so the correct car would flash its lights at me. The door locks clicked open and shut. “So you’re the new Cilantro? Mind if I call you Cori, short for Coriander?” The car just chimed until I put on my seatbelt. Cars don’t mean much to me. In this example, my confusion over a name was no big obstacle, as I plenty of fall-back ways to deal with the situation. Do you have adequate fall-back stuff in place in case there’s some typical Mercury confusion?

Taurus: Most of my Taurus friends have exquisite tastes. Taste good, too, but that’s not the question. At least the girls do. Don’t know about the guys. This isn’t about that kind of taste, though, this is about home decorations. This is about an internal yearning for a change, and this is also about not making that change now. Like wanting to redecorate the Taurus homestead in some capacity.

No.

Like wanting to hang new art on the walls.

No.

Like wanting to change the Feng Shui around so that the furniture fits better, or maybe, get new furniture.

No.

Simply put, this Mercury Retrograde makes Taurus want to change stuff at home. Home, decor, location, chi, something, anything. Not a good time for this. Great time to get a piece of paper, and sketch the idea. Get out a tape measure and see if the couch really will fit there. Great time to get one of those computer modeling programs and toy with knocking a wall out to make the game room larger. Wrong time to take a sledge hammer to wall and start those home-modifications yourself. Wait. Might want to check to see what it looks like in the cold harsh light of day. Before. You know, before you do it.

Gemini: One astrological theory suggest that the first part of the Mercury Retrograde pattern is worst for Gemini. My personal theory, and looking out how this one plays out? It’s all bad. Not bad like that, more like bad. You were warned. You had plenty of advance notice. Like most Gemini I’ve known, even an advance notice, this stuff creeps up because it’s not in the immediate “need to know” file, and therefore, not present.

We’re approaching the worst part of this retrograde. Not because it’s more than the usual amount of stupid little Mercury Retrograde problems, it’s because you’re caught up with a situation where you can’t blame Mercury confusion but that’s clearly the problem. Fax didn’t go through, email server puked, someone nuked the mail program. You get the idea. If a Gemini is alone, in forest and cries wolf, does anyone else hear? (Rhetorical question, even when all alone, there’s always several Gemini in one place.)

Cancer: We’ll take relief, in whatever form it decides to show up. It will show up, just after the weekend, soon as the sun pops out of Cancer and on into Leo. Given that Mercury is Retrograde, even though that Sun moves quickly into Leo, it doesn’t quite catch up with the idea of relief in Cancer as soon as we’d all like it. Soon, but not soon enough? To be perfectly clear, from my Zen-frame of mind, it happens as soon as it is supposed to happen.

Doesn’t mean that you can’t look forward to a little modicum of relief, of some kind. I just want promise when it hits. Soon. Very soon. As early as this weekend, as late as the begining of next week. It’s just Mercury Retrograde stuff. Not bad, just off a little.

Mars is going to heat it up, “Don’t let Mars bother you none.”