Thursday, September 25, 2003
Dreaming of Ben and Jen
Have you ever had a dream that came true? I do pretty frequently, and these premonitions are often about celebrities, oddly enough!
Stars make a lot of cameo appearances in my dreamspace. When somebody like Arnold Schwarzenegger shows up in a dream, trying to get my attention and impress me, I usually take note of it. Very specific dreams like this about a famous person usually turn out to mean something. This particular dream happened about a month before Arnold announced his run for Governor. It was like my subconscious mind suddenly picked up on the fact that he was about to assume a bigger role on the world's stage. Somehow, he registered on my mental radar. In the dream, he was shaking my hand and acting just like a would-be politician.
I occasionally dream about the Oscar winners before the yearly awards show. Helen Hunt and Jack Nicholson showed up the year that they won for Best Actor and Best Actress.
Sometimes I'll dream about sad celebrity stuff. I remember dreaming about Michael J. Fox making a big announcement about something, and about a week later, he went public about his fight with Parkinson's disease.
Also, remember when Paul McCartney's wife died of breast cancer? It wasn't announced for a week or so because the family tried to keep news of Linda's death hush-hush.
Well, sometime during that week (before most of us had heard that she had died,) I had a dream where I saw Paul standing with a shotgun. He was taking aim at some overwhelming foe, and he was exhausted, obviously losing the battle. I couldn't see what he was fighting in the vision.
It turned out, of course, that it was his wife's fight with cancer that he was exhausted from. And, unfortunately, the dream was accurate. It was a fight he (and she) couldn't win.
I also dreamed about Princess Diana about 12 hours before she died, only I was the one in the car. My dream had all of the details of what actually happened, but it all unfolded from my vantage point. I was in the car with three men, one of whom I was powerfully attracted to and happy to be with. We were speeding down a tunnel in a foreign city, and before the car hit the concrete pillar, I passed out of my body, and my life flashed before my eyes. Time was suspended in this really weird way, and I had time to reflect on every single important moment from my life. I was aware of the tremendous love I had for my family and my friends, and I felt bittersweet that I would never see them again. At the same time, I was accepting of my passage into another, light-filled dimension, and I wasn't in the least bit frightened.
I had no inkling that this was a dream about somebody else. I worried that it was about me, and that I had actually dreamt of my own impending death. I was scheduled to visit two male friends of mine in Washington, D.C., and I wondered if we would be driving through a tunnel together somewhere. I remember thinking that I wasn't going to let anybody drink alcohol so that we would be fully alert when driving.
By the time I reached my friends' house, news of Princess Diana's death was all over the radio and TV. I was sad, but I didn't immediately connect this event with my dream. When details emerged of how and when her accident had happened, a chill went through me.
I don't like predictive dreams like that. I wasn't in any position to save her, so why did I dream this dream?
I have come to think that some people have a powerful energy that connects with the masses on a subconscious level, and that, somehow, sometimes, sensitive people can tap into information about these influential folks. It's like we psychically download details about these people's lives, and this download is given to us via a dream.
But onto the dream I had last night.
Ben Affleck had invited me to join him and a small circle of friends for dinner somewhere. This seemed completely normal in the dream, as if the two of us were already buds. So, of course, I went along.
He was saying how he and Jennifer Lopez had broken up, how it hadn't worked out, etc. The weird thing was that, as he said it, he sounded completely fake, like he was over-acting. His tone was completely unconvincing.
The next thing I knew, Jennifer herself walked in, beaming, and it turns out that the two of them were going to be married in a small ceremony right there and then, with this small circle of friends looking on.
I thought this was cool.
Now, my question is, was I tapping into genuine information about the couple? They did announce a public breakup in an obvious and contrived way, and it doesn't seem very real to me.
If they did get married, bully for them, I say. Ignore the naysayers, do your own thang, and just be happy.
Who needs to watch the E! Network?
I've got it in my head already.
astrologywriter@comcast.net
Have you ever had a dream that came true? I do pretty frequently, and these premonitions are often about celebrities, oddly enough!
Stars make a lot of cameo appearances in my dreamspace. When somebody like Arnold Schwarzenegger shows up in a dream, trying to get my attention and impress me, I usually take note of it. Very specific dreams like this about a famous person usually turn out to mean something. This particular dream happened about a month before Arnold announced his run for Governor. It was like my subconscious mind suddenly picked up on the fact that he was about to assume a bigger role on the world's stage. Somehow, he registered on my mental radar. In the dream, he was shaking my hand and acting just like a would-be politician.
I occasionally dream about the Oscar winners before the yearly awards show. Helen Hunt and Jack Nicholson showed up the year that they won for Best Actor and Best Actress.
Sometimes I'll dream about sad celebrity stuff. I remember dreaming about Michael J. Fox making a big announcement about something, and about a week later, he went public about his fight with Parkinson's disease.
Also, remember when Paul McCartney's wife died of breast cancer? It wasn't announced for a week or so because the family tried to keep news of Linda's death hush-hush.
Well, sometime during that week (before most of us had heard that she had died,) I had a dream where I saw Paul standing with a shotgun. He was taking aim at some overwhelming foe, and he was exhausted, obviously losing the battle. I couldn't see what he was fighting in the vision.
It turned out, of course, that it was his wife's fight with cancer that he was exhausted from. And, unfortunately, the dream was accurate. It was a fight he (and she) couldn't win.
I also dreamed about Princess Diana about 12 hours before she died, only I was the one in the car. My dream had all of the details of what actually happened, but it all unfolded from my vantage point. I was in the car with three men, one of whom I was powerfully attracted to and happy to be with. We were speeding down a tunnel in a foreign city, and before the car hit the concrete pillar, I passed out of my body, and my life flashed before my eyes. Time was suspended in this really weird way, and I had time to reflect on every single important moment from my life. I was aware of the tremendous love I had for my family and my friends, and I felt bittersweet that I would never see them again. At the same time, I was accepting of my passage into another, light-filled dimension, and I wasn't in the least bit frightened.
I had no inkling that this was a dream about somebody else. I worried that it was about me, and that I had actually dreamt of my own impending death. I was scheduled to visit two male friends of mine in Washington, D.C., and I wondered if we would be driving through a tunnel together somewhere. I remember thinking that I wasn't going to let anybody drink alcohol so that we would be fully alert when driving.
By the time I reached my friends' house, news of Princess Diana's death was all over the radio and TV. I was sad, but I didn't immediately connect this event with my dream. When details emerged of how and when her accident had happened, a chill went through me.
I don't like predictive dreams like that. I wasn't in any position to save her, so why did I dream this dream?
I have come to think that some people have a powerful energy that connects with the masses on a subconscious level, and that, somehow, sometimes, sensitive people can tap into information about these influential folks. It's like we psychically download details about these people's lives, and this download is given to us via a dream.
But onto the dream I had last night.
Ben Affleck had invited me to join him and a small circle of friends for dinner somewhere. This seemed completely normal in the dream, as if the two of us were already buds. So, of course, I went along.
He was saying how he and Jennifer Lopez had broken up, how it hadn't worked out, etc. The weird thing was that, as he said it, he sounded completely fake, like he was over-acting. His tone was completely unconvincing.
The next thing I knew, Jennifer herself walked in, beaming, and it turns out that the two of them were going to be married in a small ceremony right there and then, with this small circle of friends looking on.
I thought this was cool.
Now, my question is, was I tapping into genuine information about the couple? They did announce a public breakup in an obvious and contrived way, and it doesn't seem very real to me.
If they did get married, bully for them, I say. Ignore the naysayers, do your own thang, and just be happy.
Who needs to watch the E! Network?
I've got it in my head already.
astrologywriter@comcast.net
Wednesday, September 24, 2003
My Life as a Sitcom?
A few months ago, I had to fire my literary agent. Normally, this is not to be advised, as literary agents are like gold. They are the passport to publication if you aspire to be a book author. Editors pretty much refuse to read book manuscripts unless they are submitted through known “channels,” i.e., through literary agents.
I've fantasized about becoming a book author since I could first pick up a pencil (and immediately insert it into one nostril as a fashion statement - say, somewhere around the age of five or so.) So when an agent finally agreed to represent my work this past spring it was a Very Big Thing Indeed. I marked the date in my diary with a big blue star. (“Dear Diary, something special happened to me today. . .”)
My mom, a former English teacher, was beaming with pride when she heard the news. Maybe her daughter would finally take a stab at crafting The Greatest American Novel.
(I didn't tell her that it was more of an expose of my dating misadventures as a young psychic in my twenties, complete with sweaty, illicit, activities. Let her think I was working on the next Moby Dick.)
I was lucky enough to have interested a New York agent in my memoir-in-progress, and she was helping me spruce up the proposal and sample chapters for submission to editors.
There was just one problem. She was performing humor amputations on my writing. Every time she came across a whimsical comment, bawdy observation, or silly scene, she'd edit it out.
This wasn't so good, as this was supposed to be a humorous memoir.
I think the moment of truth was when she excised "booger" from the preface. The context that it appeared in was this:
"I'm not sure if the man feels the same way about me, even though he seems to be enjoying our flirtation. I am suddenly self-conscious about how I look. I want to appear gorgeous so that I can properly seduce him. Is my blue skirt wrinkled? Is that a coffee stain on my white blouse? Are there boogers hanging off of me anywhere?"
When she sent me her edits and I saw that the sentence with boogers in it had simply disappeared, I felt something sink inside of me – probably my spirits. Couldn’t she see that the boogers were artfully employed in this paragraph? Didn’t she understand how the heroine, as she tells her story, is a normal, human, chick, and that she really does worry about the presence of snot on her face, especially when going out on a date with a real cutie? This was essential to the story!
There were a lot of other amputations of text, too. She was just doing her job, trying to pare the book of any excess and reshape it into something she felt she could sell. Apparently, she thought that New York editors wouldn’t appreciate the booger reference.
This just made me fume. “Who are these New York editors, to think that they are above mentioning boogers in their books? Harrumph. Aren’t boogers universal as a theme? Don’t we all have them?”
After I saw the other changes she was making to my writing, I had a cold moment of realization. This book about my life was turning into one of those dry Lifetime TV Movies for Women instead of a sassy Sex and the City or Bridget Jones' Diary.
Big difference. I bet those women on Lifetime never had problems with nasal emissions, whereas the heroines of those other tales did.
So, I parted ways with my agent.
The story has a happy ending, as the universe immediately produced a nicer, funnier, better agent, who I have been working with since then. (Laurie, if you're reading this, you're the best!) So that part worked out okay.
But before my last agent and I finished things up, she said a TV producer had called and voiced interest in pitching my memoir to TV networks as a potential sitcom.
Hmm.
The producer is a bubbly, creative type with an impressive background. I like her a lot, and we've had some great chats on the phone about different ways that the memoir would lend itself to a comedic show.
Since then, she's been actively pitching it to networks and studios. And I am SO not waiting by the phone, hoping to hear good news.
(Yeah, right.)
When Hollywood calls, it's very exciting.
There is a narrow time window in TV land for sitcoms to be pitched - from August through October, basically.
So we'll have to see. I'll know pretty soon whether or not my life will be turned into a sitcom. Stranger things have happened.
I keep telling myself that I specialize in the improbable, so manifesting this should be a piece of cake.
After all, I cavort with ghosts, chat with spiritual guides of all makes and persuasions, and experience psychic premonitions on a regular basis. If I can handle the other weird stuff, then having a TV show created around my experiences shouldn't be that much of a stretch.
I just hope that my story doesn’t end up on Lifetime.
Wouldn’t that be ironic?
astrologywriter@comcast.net
A few months ago, I had to fire my literary agent. Normally, this is not to be advised, as literary agents are like gold. They are the passport to publication if you aspire to be a book author. Editors pretty much refuse to read book manuscripts unless they are submitted through known “channels,” i.e., through literary agents.
I've fantasized about becoming a book author since I could first pick up a pencil (and immediately insert it into one nostril as a fashion statement - say, somewhere around the age of five or so.) So when an agent finally agreed to represent my work this past spring it was a Very Big Thing Indeed. I marked the date in my diary with a big blue star. (“Dear Diary, something special happened to me today. . .”)
My mom, a former English teacher, was beaming with pride when she heard the news. Maybe her daughter would finally take a stab at crafting The Greatest American Novel.
(I didn't tell her that it was more of an expose of my dating misadventures as a young psychic in my twenties, complete with sweaty, illicit, activities. Let her think I was working on the next Moby Dick.)
I was lucky enough to have interested a New York agent in my memoir-in-progress, and she was helping me spruce up the proposal and sample chapters for submission to editors.
There was just one problem. She was performing humor amputations on my writing. Every time she came across a whimsical comment, bawdy observation, or silly scene, she'd edit it out.
This wasn't so good, as this was supposed to be a humorous memoir.
I think the moment of truth was when she excised "booger" from the preface. The context that it appeared in was this:
"I'm not sure if the man feels the same way about me, even though he seems to be enjoying our flirtation. I am suddenly self-conscious about how I look. I want to appear gorgeous so that I can properly seduce him. Is my blue skirt wrinkled? Is that a coffee stain on my white blouse? Are there boogers hanging off of me anywhere?"
When she sent me her edits and I saw that the sentence with boogers in it had simply disappeared, I felt something sink inside of me – probably my spirits. Couldn’t she see that the boogers were artfully employed in this paragraph? Didn’t she understand how the heroine, as she tells her story, is a normal, human, chick, and that she really does worry about the presence of snot on her face, especially when going out on a date with a real cutie? This was essential to the story!
There were a lot of other amputations of text, too. She was just doing her job, trying to pare the book of any excess and reshape it into something she felt she could sell. Apparently, she thought that New York editors wouldn’t appreciate the booger reference.
This just made me fume. “Who are these New York editors, to think that they are above mentioning boogers in their books? Harrumph. Aren’t boogers universal as a theme? Don’t we all have them?”
After I saw the other changes she was making to my writing, I had a cold moment of realization. This book about my life was turning into one of those dry Lifetime TV Movies for Women instead of a sassy Sex and the City or Bridget Jones' Diary.
Big difference. I bet those women on Lifetime never had problems with nasal emissions, whereas the heroines of those other tales did.
So, I parted ways with my agent.
The story has a happy ending, as the universe immediately produced a nicer, funnier, better agent, who I have been working with since then. (Laurie, if you're reading this, you're the best!) So that part worked out okay.
But before my last agent and I finished things up, she said a TV producer had called and voiced interest in pitching my memoir to TV networks as a potential sitcom.
Hmm.
The producer is a bubbly, creative type with an impressive background. I like her a lot, and we've had some great chats on the phone about different ways that the memoir would lend itself to a comedic show.
Since then, she's been actively pitching it to networks and studios. And I am SO not waiting by the phone, hoping to hear good news.
(Yeah, right.)
When Hollywood calls, it's very exciting.
There is a narrow time window in TV land for sitcoms to be pitched - from August through October, basically.
So we'll have to see. I'll know pretty soon whether or not my life will be turned into a sitcom. Stranger things have happened.
I keep telling myself that I specialize in the improbable, so manifesting this should be a piece of cake.
After all, I cavort with ghosts, chat with spiritual guides of all makes and persuasions, and experience psychic premonitions on a regular basis. If I can handle the other weird stuff, then having a TV show created around my experiences shouldn't be that much of a stretch.
I just hope that my story doesn’t end up on Lifetime.
Wouldn’t that be ironic?
astrologywriter@comcast.net
Monday, September 22, 2003
Letter from a Reader
Dear Jennifer,
For years, I was an avid reader of stars, but it just got to the point when I thought "That doesn't sound like me" or "That really didn't come true." Maybe this is because my birthday, April the 19th, falls right on the cusp of Aries. But I do wonder sometimes if the writers of some horoscopes wake up of a morning and just write whatever they feel. I'd love for someone to get back to me and restore my belief in horoscopes.
Thanks for taking the time to read my email. All the best.
April G. in the UK
Hi April,
Yours is a common question, and I can totally identify with your concerns. Those daily newspaper horoscopes are too often off the mark. Sometimes it seems like the author was on acid (or suffering from an extreme bout of PMS) when she wrote them.
I actually read a horoscope recently that said:
"During housecleaning yesterday, you narrowly missed having an accident. Survival was based on adaptability. Taurus and Scorpio are involved."
This is hardly a piece of advice that is going to help you to enjoy your day. It's more likely to leave you quivering with fear, sucking your thumb in anticipation of the worst.
I don't ascribe to the "doom and gloom" school of astrology philosophy (as you can probably tell from my cheeky horoscopes.) I believe that life is a hilarious, fun, and ironic event, and that astrology forecasts should reflect this.
That said, my stuff definitely doesn't appeal to everyone.
It is, however, based on real astrology calculations. I always look at the larger, global events that everyone is going through, then I combine them with trends that are impacting upon each sign in a strong way. When you've been studying astrology as long as I have, you learn how to sift through this cosmic stew to find the interesting stuff. Each astrologer will have certain ways of looking at the stew, and our recipes are different. So you will find a lot of divergence between astrologer's styles.
In case you're wondering just how long I've been involved with astrology. . . Let's see. I'm 35 now, and back when I was ten years old, I was that annoying, geeky girl with glasses who went around asking everybody their sign, doing personality tests on each person. "Ew, you're a deceptive Scorpio, so you'll probably try to copy off my homework!" I guess that means I've had a sincere interest in the stuff for 25 years.
I think every astrologer (and writer, for that matter,) has their own slant. Some horoscopes seem really negative when you read them. Others are fluffy and pleasing, but offer little real advice.
Then there are mine, which are a weird amalgam of celebrity analogies and humorous digs. I try to poke fun at each sign equally, since we all experience similar melodramas.
You mention that you were born near the cusp of Aries. Have you ever had your birth chart done? The dates for each sign vary from year to year, so you might actually be a Taurus instead of an Aries. Send me your birthdate, and I'll be happy to look it up for you.
In the newspaper, the same dates are always listed, because there isn't room to list how it would really look:
1970 - Aries: March 22 - April 20
1971 - Aries: March 22 - April 20
1972 - Aries: March 21 - April 20
1973 - Aries: March 21 - April 20
And so on. I always feel sorry for cusp people, because unless they have their chart done, they can go around thinking that they are one sign, when they're really the other!
Cusp people are interesting, anyway. Even if you are born a day or two near the cusp, you'll tend to exhibit schizophrenic qualities. . . your personality will have aspects of both signs.
So you might find that you act a little like Taurus and a bit like Aries, making for an intriguing mix. You probably have a dose of the level-headed, sometimes cautious Taurus energy coupled with the pushier and more impulsive fire of Aries. You might switch back and forth between these modes depending on what environment you find yourself in. Your friends and family probably find you a little unpredictable because of this. Keep 'em guessing, I say! Never lose your sense of mystery.
Don't worry, there are a lot of astrological "mutts" running around out there. And each one of them is a fascinating specimen.
Thanks very much for writing. Hope this was helpful.
Jennifer
astrologywriter@comcast.net
Dear Jennifer,
For years, I was an avid reader of stars, but it just got to the point when I thought "That doesn't sound like me" or "That really didn't come true." Maybe this is because my birthday, April the 19th, falls right on the cusp of Aries. But I do wonder sometimes if the writers of some horoscopes wake up of a morning and just write whatever they feel. I'd love for someone to get back to me and restore my belief in horoscopes.
Thanks for taking the time to read my email. All the best.
April G. in the UK
Hi April,
Yours is a common question, and I can totally identify with your concerns. Those daily newspaper horoscopes are too often off the mark. Sometimes it seems like the author was on acid (or suffering from an extreme bout of PMS) when she wrote them.
I actually read a horoscope recently that said:
"During housecleaning yesterday, you narrowly missed having an accident. Survival was based on adaptability. Taurus and Scorpio are involved."
This is hardly a piece of advice that is going to help you to enjoy your day. It's more likely to leave you quivering with fear, sucking your thumb in anticipation of the worst.
I don't ascribe to the "doom and gloom" school of astrology philosophy (as you can probably tell from my cheeky horoscopes.) I believe that life is a hilarious, fun, and ironic event, and that astrology forecasts should reflect this.
That said, my stuff definitely doesn't appeal to everyone.
It is, however, based on real astrology calculations. I always look at the larger, global events that everyone is going through, then I combine them with trends that are impacting upon each sign in a strong way. When you've been studying astrology as long as I have, you learn how to sift through this cosmic stew to find the interesting stuff. Each astrologer will have certain ways of looking at the stew, and our recipes are different. So you will find a lot of divergence between astrologer's styles.
In case you're wondering just how long I've been involved with astrology. . . Let's see. I'm 35 now, and back when I was ten years old, I was that annoying, geeky girl with glasses who went around asking everybody their sign, doing personality tests on each person. "Ew, you're a deceptive Scorpio, so you'll probably try to copy off my homework!" I guess that means I've had a sincere interest in the stuff for 25 years.
I think every astrologer (and writer, for that matter,) has their own slant. Some horoscopes seem really negative when you read them. Others are fluffy and pleasing, but offer little real advice.
Then there are mine, which are a weird amalgam of celebrity analogies and humorous digs. I try to poke fun at each sign equally, since we all experience similar melodramas.
You mention that you were born near the cusp of Aries. Have you ever had your birth chart done? The dates for each sign vary from year to year, so you might actually be a Taurus instead of an Aries. Send me your birthdate, and I'll be happy to look it up for you.
In the newspaper, the same dates are always listed, because there isn't room to list how it would really look:
1970 - Aries: March 22 - April 20
1971 - Aries: March 22 - April 20
1972 - Aries: March 21 - April 20
1973 - Aries: March 21 - April 20
And so on. I always feel sorry for cusp people, because unless they have their chart done, they can go around thinking that they are one sign, when they're really the other!
Cusp people are interesting, anyway. Even if you are born a day or two near the cusp, you'll tend to exhibit schizophrenic qualities. . . your personality will have aspects of both signs.
So you might find that you act a little like Taurus and a bit like Aries, making for an intriguing mix. You probably have a dose of the level-headed, sometimes cautious Taurus energy coupled with the pushier and more impulsive fire of Aries. You might switch back and forth between these modes depending on what environment you find yourself in. Your friends and family probably find you a little unpredictable because of this. Keep 'em guessing, I say! Never lose your sense of mystery.
Don't worry, there are a lot of astrological "mutts" running around out there. And each one of them is a fascinating specimen.
Thanks very much for writing. Hope this was helpful.
Jennifer
astrologywriter@comcast.net
Thursday, September 18, 2003
Retrograde Sucks
I don’t know about you, but I've been feeling like my brain is covered with goo and my intellect has been evacuated to the Lesser Antilles for the last couple of weeks.
I'm going to blame this on Mercury being in retrograde, and I think you should, too.
Mercury goes retrograde about three times a year for a period of approximately three and a half weeks. Much as I scoff and try to downplay the idea that a chunk of rock in the sky could have any effect on me, I always find that Mercury retrograde periods are intense and fraught with odd events.
Mercury has been in retrograde since August 28th, and it will move out of retrograde (turning direct again) on September 20th.
During these times, there seem to be a larger percentage of celebrity deaths (John Ritter and Johnny Cash, unfortunately, having made their exodus during this Mercury retrograde.)
Weather snafus also are more common (Hurricanes Fabian and Isabel, anyone?)
Political movements and proposed laws tend to be interrupted (Hmm. Interesting that California is now trying to delay the recall vote.)
There are also a larger percentage of technology glitches than usual. (Also interesting that the reason why they are supposedly postponing the recall vote is because of the voting machines malfunctioning.)
These are some of the global effects. On a personal level, Mercury retrograde periods tend to feel a little heavy, and you'll find it harder to focus.
As a writer who crafts sentences for a living, I notice that during Mercury retrograde times I feel slightly retarded. Instead of effortlessly churning out pages of text, I mindlessly doodle my name in the margins of a page (practicing for a time when I'll have to sign lots of autographs, I guess.) I can do this all day, rather like the Rain Man.
This is not a good thing! Arrgh! Where did my brains go?
Mercury retrograde also creates little hassles and delays. Things just don't flow the way they are supposed to.
During this particular retrograde time, here are some things that I experienced:
Showing up at a comedy club to see my favorite comedian, who rarely makes appearances in my area…..and she called in sick, so I didn't get to see her, after all.
Downloading files that came out so garbled that it seemed like the writer was cursing me in an alien tongue. (@))#$*%& &*$^%(#*) *&$^&&^% (*&^@%>)
Receiving an inordinate amount of advertisements for penis enlargement products. (Thanks, I appreciate your concern, but for the moment, I appear to be doing okay in that department.)
Receiving hate mail from readers of my astrology column. It's weird. This always happens to me during Mercury retrograde, never at any other time. This particular piece of hate mail took issue with the fact that I am prone to relentlessly teasing Michael Jackson in my column. (But I don't just take pot shots at him. I attempt to be egalitarian in my distribution of celebrity abuse. Celine Dion, Ben and Jen, and Titney Spears also receive their share of hits.)
Losing my keys. I haven't lost my keys in at least ten years. I lost them during Mercury retrograde. This is starting to make me a little paranoid. What else is going to happen? Am I going to misplace something important, like my secret emergency stockpile of chocolate? (And no, I'm not going to tell you where it is.)
During Mercury retrograde, things will often need to be redone. No matter how well you try to do something the first time, you'll probably have to edit it, make revisions, or just start from scratch and do it over.
Case in point: my boyfriend went in to have a crown replaced, and they had made the crown the wrong size, so he'll have to go back to the dentist. (Lesson: never make dental appointments during Mercury retrograde, unless you're the type who enjoys repeatedly reclining in The Chair of Tooth Torture.)
Oh, and Earl, my huge, white, meatloaf of a cat, disappeared for almost a week, giving me major heart attacks. (Cat in retrograde!) He's an indoor/outdoor cat, but we spoil him something awful, so he generally comes around every day and spends a lot of time sleeping inside. He took off to chase women or carouse with the boys, and I was certain I was going to find his mangled, fuzzy remains somewhere. Thank the cat gods (Who would that be, Bastet?,) he finally returned home the other night. (He was full of adrenaline and immediately beat up on all the other cats. I guess that was his special way of staging a reunion.)
I won't even mention the haircut I'm not happy with (hair in retrograde!,) or the overly ambitious new recipes I tried to make for dinner (think Stir Fry from Hell and Embarrassingly Undercooked Fish.)
I know, you could simply conclude that I'm a doofus and a klutz, and that these things just mean I'm a loser.
But 'fess up. . . haven't you been a loser, too, these past few weeks?
Smile! At least you've got company.
Looking forward to the 20th, when Mercury goes direct - just two happy days away!
Note: I am going to be updating this blog once or twice a week, at minimum, now. So come back and see me sometime, ya hear?
Email me: astrologywriter@comcast.net
I don’t know about you, but I've been feeling like my brain is covered with goo and my intellect has been evacuated to the Lesser Antilles for the last couple of weeks.
I'm going to blame this on Mercury being in retrograde, and I think you should, too.
Mercury goes retrograde about three times a year for a period of approximately three and a half weeks. Much as I scoff and try to downplay the idea that a chunk of rock in the sky could have any effect on me, I always find that Mercury retrograde periods are intense and fraught with odd events.
Mercury has been in retrograde since August 28th, and it will move out of retrograde (turning direct again) on September 20th.
During these times, there seem to be a larger percentage of celebrity deaths (John Ritter and Johnny Cash, unfortunately, having made their exodus during this Mercury retrograde.)
Weather snafus also are more common (Hurricanes Fabian and Isabel, anyone?)
Political movements and proposed laws tend to be interrupted (Hmm. Interesting that California is now trying to delay the recall vote.)
There are also a larger percentage of technology glitches than usual. (Also interesting that the reason why they are supposedly postponing the recall vote is because of the voting machines malfunctioning.)
These are some of the global effects. On a personal level, Mercury retrograde periods tend to feel a little heavy, and you'll find it harder to focus.
As a writer who crafts sentences for a living, I notice that during Mercury retrograde times I feel slightly retarded. Instead of effortlessly churning out pages of text, I mindlessly doodle my name in the margins of a page (practicing for a time when I'll have to sign lots of autographs, I guess.) I can do this all day, rather like the Rain Man.
This is not a good thing! Arrgh! Where did my brains go?
Mercury retrograde also creates little hassles and delays. Things just don't flow the way they are supposed to.
During this particular retrograde time, here are some things that I experienced:
Showing up at a comedy club to see my favorite comedian, who rarely makes appearances in my area…..and she called in sick, so I didn't get to see her, after all.
Downloading files that came out so garbled that it seemed like the writer was cursing me in an alien tongue. (@))#$*%& &*$^%(#*) *&$^&&^% (*&^@%>)
Receiving an inordinate amount of advertisements for penis enlargement products. (Thanks, I appreciate your concern, but for the moment, I appear to be doing okay in that department.)
Receiving hate mail from readers of my astrology column. It's weird. This always happens to me during Mercury retrograde, never at any other time. This particular piece of hate mail took issue with the fact that I am prone to relentlessly teasing Michael Jackson in my column. (But I don't just take pot shots at him. I attempt to be egalitarian in my distribution of celebrity abuse. Celine Dion, Ben and Jen, and Titney Spears also receive their share of hits.)
Losing my keys. I haven't lost my keys in at least ten years. I lost them during Mercury retrograde. This is starting to make me a little paranoid. What else is going to happen? Am I going to misplace something important, like my secret emergency stockpile of chocolate? (And no, I'm not going to tell you where it is.)
During Mercury retrograde, things will often need to be redone. No matter how well you try to do something the first time, you'll probably have to edit it, make revisions, or just start from scratch and do it over.
Case in point: my boyfriend went in to have a crown replaced, and they had made the crown the wrong size, so he'll have to go back to the dentist. (Lesson: never make dental appointments during Mercury retrograde, unless you're the type who enjoys repeatedly reclining in The Chair of Tooth Torture.)
Oh, and Earl, my huge, white, meatloaf of a cat, disappeared for almost a week, giving me major heart attacks. (Cat in retrograde!) He's an indoor/outdoor cat, but we spoil him something awful, so he generally comes around every day and spends a lot of time sleeping inside. He took off to chase women or carouse with the boys, and I was certain I was going to find his mangled, fuzzy remains somewhere. Thank the cat gods (Who would that be, Bastet?,) he finally returned home the other night. (He was full of adrenaline and immediately beat up on all the other cats. I guess that was his special way of staging a reunion.)
I won't even mention the haircut I'm not happy with (hair in retrograde!,) or the overly ambitious new recipes I tried to make for dinner (think Stir Fry from Hell and Embarrassingly Undercooked Fish.)
I know, you could simply conclude that I'm a doofus and a klutz, and that these things just mean I'm a loser.
But 'fess up. . . haven't you been a loser, too, these past few weeks?
Smile! At least you've got company.
Looking forward to the 20th, when Mercury goes direct - just two happy days away!
Note: I am going to be updating this blog once or twice a week, at minimum, now. So come back and see me sometime, ya hear?
Email me: astrologywriter@comcast.net
