Three little words I will never say. .

Even after 20 years of astrological studies, through all my adventures with the FAS, Rainbow Circle, The Lodge, The Sophia Centre, UAC and a day at the History of Astrology seminar followed by an evening at The Lodge, you will never hear me say "Astrology bores me."

On Monday night, we at The Lodge were treated to the brilliance of Chris Brennan who patiently explained what the hell to do with the lot of fortune! Finally! After years of having it hanging around on my chart looking rather useless, Chris gets it to make sense. And this is truly the beauty of astrology and why I'm absolutely delighted to call myself forevermore a astudent of astrology: no one is ever going to know it all. There's always something new to learn--and Chris had me diving straight for my ephemeris when I got home on Monday. To learn more, go to Chris' website.

One thing I do know is that there is some weird weather going on! Left is the view from my window on Tuesday night. Snow in October?

For reaching the parts that other schools of astrology can't reach, here's a little Mars conjunct Saturn in the eighth house joke (and quite possibly how I've been feeling about certain schools of astrology!) just for Chris. . .

A Jamaican (and pardon my Jamaican accent) fireman comes home from his first day on the job and says: "Wo-mon, dey do tings right at de station! When de first bell goes, we all jump up. When de second bell goes, we all go down de pole. When de tird bell goes, we all jump on de truck!"

"Wow," says the wife, "Dat sounds efficient!"

"So wo-mon," says the man, "From now on, we gonna do dis: When I shout "Bell One!" you strip naked. When I shout "Bell two!" you jump on de bed. When I shout "Bell three!" we make love all de night long!"

So they give it try. Bell one, she strips. Bell two, she gets nekkid. Bell three, they start to make love all de night long.

A few minutes into it, she yells, "Bell four!"

"Wo-mon, what are you talking about? There's no bell four!"

"Oh yes dere is!"

"What does it mean?" he asks.

She says: "Roll out de hose, it ain't no where near de fire!"

Credit Crunch

This weekend was the Astrological Lodge's History of Astrology Seminar, an event I take great pains not to miss. However, Saturday I had to go to a birthday party and demonstrate my considerable karaoke skills and then force myself to partake in a delicious Turkish meal. So I couldn't get to the seminar on Saturday because I was so obligated which meant I knew better than to even attempt to miss out on Sunday's fun and frolics--not the least because my good friend and Sophia Centre travelling buddy Maurice McCann would be giving his final public lecture. However, Sunday morning I woke up and thought "Oh no! I've slept in and missed Maurice McCann's lecture!" So I pulled myself together and got on the tube toute de suite--and then discovered that I had forgotten all about the clocks going back, lol. So I was only a little late and didn't miss a word of Maurice's lecture on Bonatti. Nor did I miss Maurice's unprecedented attack on the three Roberts which must have made Pico do cartwheels. And yes, Maurice, it was recorded! And c'mon, you can't bow out without being prepared to have the last word (and you know you won't be getting the last word if you stop now)! Secretly, I think Maurice will be back. . .

I also bumped into the delightful Sue Ward whom I will always remember for her spectacular lecture at the AA Conference. Sue has the admirable knack for making very complicated points crystal clear. Unforgettable! Sue also appreciates my fruity language and even threatened to quote me once (she bottled out). But I don't hold it against her. When I read Maurice's lecture at the Bath Spa graduate conference, he put a little note at the bottom of his notes with the instructions: "Don't forget to tell Rob Hand (who was in the audience) that I got his number!" Needless to say, I bottled out. Perhaps Sue and I share the common trait of knowing when to keep quiet. Somehow, I doubt that. . .

OK, we're in the middle of a credit crunch and I've been blowing all my dosh on a thoroughly spectacular weekend with a wide range of people. In fact, I'm feeling rather blessed and thank the gods and goddesses that be for my good fortune. But that's not to say I haven't been exploring ways to cut corners and be frugal. Here'a little Saturn in Cancer in the second house advice I won't be following though. . .

A little old man is taking his evening walk when he sees a woman with perfect breasts. He gets closer and says to her, “Hey lady would let me bite your breasts for £500?”

“Are you crazy?!! she replies and keeps walking away.

He keeps a few steps behind and makes another offer; “Would you let me bite your breasts for £1,000?”

The woman turns back and says, “Listen you; I’m not that kind of a woman! Got it?”

But the very determined old man walking a few feet behind says; “Would you let me bite your breast just once for £10,000?”

The woman stops, thinks about it for a while and says, “Hmmm, £10,000; OK, just once, but let's go to that dark alley.”

They go to the alley, where she takes off her top to reveal the most gorgeous breasts he has ever seen. He grabs them and starts fondling them slowly, caressing them, kissing them, licking them, burying his face in them, but not biting them.

The woman gets annoyed and asks, “Well? Are you going to bite them or not?”

“Nah,” says the old man. “Costs too much…”

Over HERE, Rupert

Dammit Rupert, I said talk to ME! LOL

I went to hear a dialogue with Rupert Sheldrake and Andrew Cohen last Friday: Is evolution sacred? It was, without a hint of sarcasm, one of the most interesting experiences I have ever had and a radical change to my usual Friday night programme (ie, the pub). The topic covered the idea of enlightenment, a notion I always left to those granola-eating floaty type people wearing kaftans. What made it intriguing? It was the way these two men, with their vastly differing views, listened to each other and respected each others' opinions. To say it was an intense experience would be an understatement and there's no way I will even try to sum up what I got out of it, let alone try to explain what someone else might have gotten out of it. However, I will give my viewpoint on animals and enlightenment (since, quite surprisingly, Andrew and I seemed a bit at odds over the topic). Andrew said animals don't have a sense of enlightenment. Well, I disagree and this is why: my cats look directly at my face as if trying to understand my expressions. If they had no interest in me as a fellow being, why would they look at my face? Why don't they just watch what is moving? I think my cats have an awareness of me just as much as I have an awareness of them. Are my cats capable of enlightenment? Who the hell am I to say! But just look at me and my cat Bubbles sleeping! He's in my bed, under my covers with his paw on my shoulder as if to reassure me that he loves me. Anthropromorphic drivel? Yeah probably I'm projecting all over the place. But isn't Bubbles sweet?

To celebrate the potential for cats to become enlightened (and I'm not limiting this potential to cats--in fact, I might even be implying, with my next joke, that animals even have a soul!), here's a very special Mars in the 6th house joke:

One day a cat dies of natural causes and goes to heaven. There he meets the Lord Himself. The Lord says to the cat, "You lived a good life and if there is any way I can make your stay in Heaven more comfortable, please let Me know."

The cat thinks for a moment and says, "Lord, all my life I have lived with a poor family and had to sleep on a hard wooden floor."

The Lord stops the cat and says, "Say no more," and a wonderful fluffy pillow appears.

A few days later, six mice are killed in a tragic farming accident and go to heaven. Again, there is the Lord there to great them with the same offer.

The mice answered, "All of our lives we have been chased. We have had to run from cats, dogs and even women with brooms. Running, running, running; we're tired of running. Do you think we could have roller skates so we don't have to run anymore?"

The Lord says, "Say no more," and fits each mouse with beautiful new roller skates.

About a week later the Lord stops by to see the cat and finds him snoozing on the pillow. The Lord gently wakes the cat and asks him, "How are things since you got here?"

The cat stretches and yawns and replies, "It is wonderful here. Better than I could have ever expected. And those 'Meals On Wheels' you've been sending by are the best!"

Kiss me, I can triple tongue

Update: I'm starting a one woman campaign to get Wynton onto astrodatabank. To do this, I need his time of birth. If anyone can help out, please let me know!

Now on to the regularly scheduled programme.

I've been a Wynton Marsalis fan since I was a kid. I played the trumpet in the Salvation Army and I used to listen to Wynton after band practice just to get a bit of equilibrium. Wynton started playing the trumpet at age six, around the year I was born (oh yeah, this explains why he's so much better than me!). He said he wanted to make somebody feel like John Coltrane made him feel listening it. OK, Wynton, you do it for me, baby. I could (and do!) listen to you all night. You inspire me to drag myself out to South London for jazz band practice.

To honour Wynton, here's a little video from youtube. By the way, this was what I played for my final recital at University. Only, I um, wasn't quite so damn good. But nearly. This reminds me of the traditional trumpet player greeting:

"Hi. Nice to meet you. I'm better than you."

But I think I could restrain from saying this to Wynton.

Oh-oh, I can feel a joke just for Wynton coming up! This one is Sun conjunct Jupiter in Pisces in the tenth with a square to Saturn:

A great jazz trumpet player dies and goes to heaven. When he gets there, he finds out that heaven has a jazz band and rehearsal is about to begin. When he arrives at the rehearsal, he finds out that it is the biggest jazz band he had ever seen. There were over twenty trumpet players, including all the greats, like Miles Davis, Dizzy Gillespie, Louis Armstrong, and many others. The band sounds incredible, the best he had ever heard, and all of the players were great, with one exception. The lead player was horrible! The lead player had no high chops, couldn't play a decent swing groove, and could not improvise. Yet this horrible player was on lead, really looked like he was getting into the songs, and looked incredibly smug and pleased with himself after every song. Incredulous, he asked the player next to him, "Who is that guy? He's horrible!"

The other player replied, "Oh, that's just God. He only likes to think that he's Wynton Marsalis."

I love you, Wynton. Happy Birthday!!

The new AA journal editor!!

So, here I am standing next to John Green, the new AA editor. I'm going to stop standing next to slim people. Reminds me of a Jupiter cj the ascendant joke with Saturn in the eighth (inconjunct Jupiter for very obvious reasons):

A man is cooking in his back yard on his BBQ grill. He glances over at his wife and notices how large her behind is.

He then looks at his grill and looks back at his wife and says, "Honey I think your butt might be as big as the grill!"

He didn't stop there, he then went into the house and got a tape measure and measured the grill then his wife's ass.

Later that night, the couple decided to get a little frisky in bed.

The wife then said “I don't see any reason for me to fire up this fat-ass grill for that little weiner."

BTW, this joke has nothing to do with John!

Yup, still going on about the conference

And I'm still telling Satan jokes. . .but not because I had the chance to spend some time with the devilishly gorgeous Ben Dykes (left).

I met Ben at the United Astrology Conference in Denver and he is not only a young man of great intelligence (a PhD and all!) but he's a genuinely nice guy. He's also very generous with the vodka. Ben did some translations of Bonatti's work--how clever is that!?--which he will be presenting at the Lodge history seminar later this month.

So, in honour of devishly gorgeous men, here's a little Pluto in the 7th house joke:

One bright, beautiful Sunday morning, everyone in the small New England town got up early and went to the local church. Before the services started, the townspeople were sitting in their pews and idly chatting about their lives, their families, etc., when suddenly, Satan appeared at the front of the church. Everyone started screaming and running for the front entrance, trampling each other in a frantic effort to get away from evil incarnate. Everyone quickly evacuated the Church, except for one elderly gentleman who sat calmly in his pew, not moving... seemingly oblivious to the fact that God's ultimate enemy was in his presence. Now this confused Satan a bit, so he walked up to the man and said, "Do you not know who I am?"

The man replied, "Yep, sure do."

Satan asked, "Aren't you afraid of me?"

"Nope, sure ain't," said the man.

Satan was a little perturbed at this and queried,"Why aren't you afraid of me?"

The man calmly replied, "Been married to your sister for over 31 years."