Now set the teeth and stretch the nostril wide,
Hold hard the breath, and bend up every spirit
To his full height!

Shakespeare’s Henry V 3.1

Horoscopes for 5.21.2020

Gemini

One associate was using this kind of a time as a teaching point for Gemini. Showed, to me, a lack of true Gemini understanding, though, as the mercurial Gemini mind needs the data spit out quickly, relatively succinct, and in a fashion that is easy to digest. Think in terms of bullet points, converting the main areas, love, money, job, finances, relationships, and material wealth. All kinds of variations on themes, if I understand correctly. Then, like I suggested, organized as bullet points, or just as topic headings, or just material wherein the individual can fill in the appropriate data as need be. “I need all three: money, love, and romance!” Or, “Love career, and income.” Sort of varies, but it is essentially the three biggest, most pressing Gemini questions — and answers — then that material needs to be distilled into simple points. Think in terms of a graphic representation of the material, like done as an outline, then flashed before our non-Gemini eyes. I’ve got it! Birthday time, do it as flash cards! Mercurial learning requires concise, easy-to-grasp bulletin, missive, headline notes. Do it as flash cards, like, Happy Birthday!

Cancer

I was looking for a new phone cover because the first one for this phone, it was an expensive name brand item. Maybe get a fancy leather case? The problem is the last one, in a few short months, frayed around the corners. Part of the leather departed, and left the underside unprotected. I started shopping, online, for a new cover. The problem being? I’ll probably have a new phone before the new cover even arrives. The lifespan of tech? I usually stretch out and try to leapfrog tech, and anymore? Keeping up is too hard some days. What I did, instead?

I looked at the frayed and decaying old cover, not really that old, not more than few months, maybe a year old? I got out some handy super glue stuff, two drops, and the case looks OK. I know it’s frayed. It knows shows signs of wear, but the phone inside is protected, everything functions properly, and the super glue fix will probably hold until I upgrade. There is such a thing as overthinking a problem and solution. A drop of Superglue goes a long way, and can save Moon Children money.

The Leo

You’re not going to like me this week. Please update your online images. Part of this is leftover experiences from when I was amateur astrologer, and professional geek. Different lifetime (concurrent with this one, back in the days of yore). I got upset at certain groups that would use an image from, perhaps right after college and still be using that same image, 20, 30 years later, as a front-facing publicity shot. Just looks bad. I tend to favor current images. In this day of phoneS with good cameras? There’s no excuse. I’m out glad I did all my really stupid stuff before there were phones with video capability. Yeah, some of that is best forgotten. I did have a series of professionally-shot images, and then I “dated” one photographer for a spell, again, you could always tell her work, but that’s not what this is about. It’s about keeping material, whatever front-facing Leo material there is? Keep that current. Doesn’t have to be a glamor shot. Doesn’t need to be professionally cropped and all that stuff, horoscopes, touch-up, and whatever, just do something that is current. Here’s the trick: you’re going to hate it. Here’s the tricky part: you’ll get to change before your birthday for a much better image, but only if you update that stuff now.

Virgo

I finally figured out what deal was. It’s the way certain foods are presented? In this case it was upscale tacos, and there was an artful flourish to the sauce laced across the top of the essentially open-face sandwich. There was a zig-zag pattern to the sauce itself. Made for a great display and didn’t layer on too much of the orange (Habanero) sauce, as that was concurrent with an Aioli redolent in a garlic-goodness. The two elements with some artisan pulled pork? Delicious. The realization, though, was that it was just squirt of the sauce, a mere zigzag of a condiment rather than what I would do, with great pools of the stuff.

Works in two ways, and works in two ways that Virgo can pay attention to, for now: one? Uses less sauces so this artistic display is actually cheaper. Uses less material. Cost efficient, saves on the Virgo “bottom line.” Then, two? Neither the garlic nor the habanero overpowers the flavor baked into the pulled pork. There’s a certain kind of mastery involved in teasing out the pork’s slow-roasted flavor. Again, this all works together as a coherent whole. Go for cheaper, or go for hints rather then swimming in sauce, to greatly enhance the Virgo flavors, this next week or so.

Libra

I found an online “tool” that spelled out the basics of color theory. I was looking for complimentary colors for the websites I tend to, and what looked best. I would prefer a basic bland, grey-scale, white kind of pattern, but what pleases me might not be the best idea. Never claimed to have good tastes, but erring on the conservative side of taste helps. However, the tool itself, while it was fun to work with, picking random colors, foreground, background, edges, trim, like decorating a make-believe house? It was an amusing task. I tend to favor “fall” colors, but to me, the colors are less like “fall,” and more like warm leather, and heavy, dark-stained wood tones. Again, all about perceptions. While I would favor that kind coloring, after a while, the colors started to annoy me. Some thing wasn’t quite right. The joy in this kind of a gig? I can change this stuff up as much as I want. Click, click-click, scroll, hit “Update,” and it’s a new pattern, a new color, and different shades of — just different tones. The point of the tool and its color-selection was to use it as a guideline to help me be better at picking colors. There’s some kind of color theory that I don’t understand, nor will I understand, but there’s a subtle art to picking the right pastel, ochre, whatever shades, to make this all more pleasing, The joy in my work? The setting are easy enough to adjust — and change. Don’t be afraid to experiment with tools that teach.

Scorpio

With several male buddies, I’ve watched, observed, and listened. There’s a drive, occurs at a certain point, but there’s a drive that occurs, and there’s an apparent incessant desire for a female companion who is much, much younger. This rarely ends well. Then, there’s the notion that a typical Scorpio male can juggle a plethora of “love interests” — at one time. Lovers, plural. Again, this is not an attractive trait. The problem with a Scorpio secret lover? Those secret lovers tend to come forward at an inconvenient time.

Like now.

This isn’t about illicit love, or a romance that was never meant to be, but this is about what’s appropriate — and what’s not. I tend to favor “age-appropriate” relationships because there’s a better chance of success. Not that an occasional May-December deal doesn’t work, but the odds aren’t good on that. We all have dreams, but this is a time to reel those dreams in and stick with what has the highest chance of success. Stick with what works. Or, if that’s not clear enough, Scorpio should stick with Scorpio-compliant individuals and scenarios.

Sagittarius

I was in a — let’s call it a social setting — and I kept hearing a dull, background noise. Sounded like a TV show or something, running on someone’s phone. I looked around. Wasn’t the woman next to me, although, she did keep checking her phone. Wasn’t the guy in front of me, as I watched, he actually turned his phone off. I discreetly pulled my own phone out, and looked. It was one of Shakespeare’s play, read aloud, running at the quiet setting. The subtle droning of voices that were too low in volume to make out? Sure, and it was me, as it turned out. Somehow I toggled the audio playback — unbeknownst to me. I toggled it off, glancing around sheepishly, “Hope no one saw that,” I thought. Kind thing that happens, in our post modern world. Phone’s audio gets triggered. Not all that unusual, I guess. Just sorry it was me. I was prepared to mock someone else. Which is what this week’s weirdness is about. Before we start deriding some fool for leaving their phones on during an inappropriate time? Check our own equipment, first. Might be us. Check first before assumptions and accusations.

Capricorn

Yeah, yeah, holidays and all, but think: Capricorn, think — this is about a weird way to solve a strange issue that has to do with that career stuff. After this “shelter in place?” Work from home? One buddy started walking to work. I was like that for years, but for this downtown buddy, it was a new way, almost novel way, to get to work. Little over a mile, not like a really long distance from his apartment to the office, but instead of getting in a car and driving almost two miles, with parking, traffic and the ensuing heartaches, he started to walk. Won’t walk in the rain, and I don’t blame him, neither will I, given a choice. But the idea is that the walk gives him chance to think without thinking. Sounds a little too Zen-like? Think about it while working out at the gym. Think about it while driving to and from the office. Or wherever it is that one works. The answer, and there’s a corollary that goes with this thought process for the Capricorn stars — “lipstick on a pig.” Think about that while working own this issue. You are freely allowed to borrow from me as I borrowed it from another buddy, but that’s what he was thinking about, as the first solution wasn’t acceptable.

Aquarius

One trick I learned, when I was discussing my written work, was how to proofread material — my own material. The suggestion was to start at the back. Not quite read backwards, but almost. When one horoscope broken up into two or more parts? Read the second part first, then read the first part, and this is especially useful when the material is something I’ve previewed more than once. It’s easier to catch mistakes by trying to read out of context. I have lousy grammar. I know this. I tend to dangle, mangle, and otherwise abuse the language, and sometimes, frequently, this is accidental. Expecting to catch the mistakes in the copy-editing process used to be realistic, but these days? It’s a little more difficult — hence the tip about reading it all backwards. Helps when the individual pieces are broken into halves. The original idea for this was from book copy-editor, hat tip to Virgo, who used to read the individual manuscript pages, one by one, in reverse order. Good trick. Graciously purloined and modified. So the idea, to catch the meaning in this week’s set of symbols? Start at the back and work forward. Or, in other words, I start at the destination, then work my way backwards to the starting point.

Pisces

Personally, I severely detest “YouTube instructional videos.” Just not my favorite way to receive instructions. That’s more about how I’m wired than it is about the videos themselves; although, in most cases, the amateur videos are rather interesting with their dubious production values. Some good, mostly half-good, and occasionally, really interesting stuff is buried about three-quarters of the way through. But those instructional videos, the ubiquitous “how to” series? That’s not how I learn. Doesn’t work for me. I need printed instructions with diagrams, if need be, but printed. I learn best by reading the instructions, then skipping ahead three pages, then back a paragraph and then, starting at the beginning again. That’s what this next couple of days is like for my Pisces friends. Skip ahead. Scroll back. Re-read that third paragraph. Bounce around as need be to get a sense of the directions and, which way we might be going. I’d love for a Pisces specific linear route to navigate this week, but that’s not happening. Skip to the end, then read backwards, even?

Aries

Some of the circles, especially social and professional circles, some of the places I’ve been? We are all taught to speak our mind. Respectfully, but correctly, speak our peace. Stand up for what we know is right. Stand up for what is good and proper. Make our voices heard. All of that social training? All of that goes out the window, and this is the one week I’ll use this form of advice for Aries: shut up. Sit down; shut up.

“We will not stand for this!”

No, and what I’m suggesting, given where the planets are, and what those planets portend? The best way to through this mess is to be non-confrontational. The quieter? The better. This is not a permanent solution; this is very temporary. If I were more Aries-like? I would be rehearsing what I was going to tell everyone, once I got an all-clear from the astrology of the moment. But for now?

Please, be quiet.

Don’t ask if this is advice I myself follow, as I seem to have trouble keeping my mouth shut. But I’m not the Aries in this situation. “Better to let them guess that you might be a fool, rather than open your mouth, speak, prove it so.”

Taurus

Want to stretch the malleable sense of time? Go shopping in a Walmart. Masks, gloves, social distancing aside, it’s still the same. There is some kind of warp in the typical time-space continuum, a way that the fields of ordinary reality and our consensual understanding thereof, somehow, this gets bent in a Walmart. Don’t believe me?

Try it.

Five, seven minutes in a Walmart can feel like hours. I’m not complaining, and maybe, as I get older, I like stretching my time out by going to a Walmart. As an idea, this has merit. I’m not suggesting buying anything there, just spending enough time to see if the malleable nature of the elastic sense of time holds up. Planets — planet — Venus? Need something that can stretch time out to help Taurus. Try shopping in a Walmart, and see if that doesn’t stretch time out.

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“Nothing runs on automatic.” – L.W. “Bud” Shipley, Jr.