Capricorn 18° (January 9)

This is when I feel the real trouble might have started. S. will be meeting up with Esther to go to the Dora Mar. I will seun and talk with M and E and S (love, like and not so much) and they tell me that they are not renewing our project for next year which is rather shocking and sad. I was not set up for even more disappointment; but I suppose it’s good that all of this is happening at once. I’m getting what’s happening already. I am drowning a bit in all of this I must say. I head to Bethnal Green to meet S. and look at rooms at Town Hall. I pay in advance. We walk back and decide to hit The Grocery thinking there is a meal to be had there. There isn’t. So we go for pasta at Burro e Salvia. I’m not coping well with my emotions. I decide to stay out on my own a bit which was on the one hand wrong and on the other totally necessary. I think I’m kind of bummed about moving to Bethnal Green. I’m also panicked at the amount of stuff we have and how the hell we are going to manage getting onto the Eurostar with all of it. I am going to try and pack absolutely everything into my two bags because, otherwise, I won’t have enough hands to handle all that will need handling. I suppose it isn’t such a bad thing that I have left or lost some stuff. I might also leave a bag of things at P + M’s.

Travel (which falls under the astrological 9^thhouse) is about expanding our horizons, exposing us to exotic influences, and exercising our capacity to embrace diversity. The more we go forth boldly in exploration of extrinsic experiences, the more we find increasing understanding of ourselves and our inner lives.Careers should grow out of your greatest ambitions. You might end up having more than one, as your focus evolves over time. Still, especially in your youth, it is important to pinpoint that which you both love and at which you excel. Don’t ever have a Plan B at any given time. Find what you’re best at, then do your best at it.

And now the same old worries and what ifs. Is it really worth it. We went to Aesop and bought a bunch of stuff but I think they forgot to give me one of my products which I find slightly impossible but there you have it. Smoke gets in your eyes. Alice mentioned this great massage therapist and I’m going to make an appointment for sure. How the hell can I bring myself back. I haven’t been sleeping more than three or four hours each night and it is definitely beginning to take a toll. I have to leave plenty of time for packing. We are making our plans too, now, for Venice. It is something that has to occur. We won’t go to Switzerland. I don’t want to go to Switzerland. That was the best pasta in the world from what I can remember. There has to be more to life than catching up. Why do others always seem in front of the eight ball I’m behind. I will pull myself up by the boot straps and have no more of this. There is no point really. The stuff we are seeing on the jewelry front is amazing. And it does feel wonderful to be in explorer mode. I will say that the O+P night was an event to which creatives were invited so I could tell them what I do in hopes of finding a like venue here in London. I cannot believe I have been here already as long as I have. I feel as if no time has passed and yet it seems like a world away, that place we live. This has been an invaluable trip despite increasing tensions which are soon to come to a head. The great inevitable. Does anybody read this? It doesn’t much matter. I’m start to align my thoughts with my actions and to ride the wave. I will talk to the Boston Arts Center as well. And also Emerson. Other places have become a dead zone. The Museum School? Oh, Please.

To view the original Sabian Symbol themed 2015 Cosmic Blague corresponding to this day: Flashback! The degree pointof the Sabian Symbol will be one degree higher than the one listed for today. The Blague portrays the starting degree of for this day ( 0°,  for instance), as I typically post in the morning, while the Sabian number corresponds to the end point (1°) of that same 0°-1° period. There are 360  degrees spread over 365 or 6 days per year—so they near but not exactly correlate.

Typos happen. I don’t have a proofreader. And I like to just write, post and go!
Copyright 2020 Wheel Atelier Inc. All Rights Reserved.
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Capricorn 17° (January 8)

So after a late morning we will head to the Grocery which is Nirvana. The skies open. S. gets a flapjack. I am carrying an empty bag otherwise which I will eventually forget and leave and lose at a gastro pub. I’m sad in advance of that. Oh well. Get over it. We peer into a shop and see A. with a friend. It is a shop where the young man makes leather goods. I know this will not end without a purchase—we make little ones on the spot—but a big one, I don’t foresee, will come later in the week. We also then visit a fellow jeweler before heading to Brawn for lunch with the assistant working on the collection. We go over all the stones vis a vis all the colors. I come back and write down all the notes: Grassier green for Taurus, paler buttery yellow for Gemini, Cancer will be white enamel and a moonstone. Leo will be khaki. Virgo will go more grey in color and have a water sapphire. We are going darker red for Scorpio, like dried blood with the fire something. Sag will be blue topaz and purple. Aquarius will be the tanzanite with a more sky blue. Pisces we went with the darker seafoam. I will begin to make these connections for the words that accompany the collection.

We then had a chat with Meg, pin in that. And we had a client by Facetime, who was in the Bahamas actually. Back to the Meg thing. We learn some more about what happened. I’m upset and reeling. I’m actually hungry and S. is not. I go to the Smoking Goat for some spicy musssels and try to write some things down in real time. I did actually draft a letter that I will sit on until I find out what the outcome will be with our agent. I’m happy to go out with a different book from the one we proposed. We quite simply want to get something into works and can and will make that happen in short order. I have the strength to persevere, this much I know about myself. I might not have houses someone bought me so to launder money, nor do I have a sham existence built on hubris and self-delusion. Rather I have a real life that has taken a real toll but has offered me some real promise for the future. I heard from Stefan. What an effing nutjob he turned out to be. The books will do what the books will do but I must get to promoting the crap out of them as best we can. Working on a don’t do it alone theme me thinks. 

We have scoured every single one of our emails for any kind of infraction in reaction to the fact/time/incident when HarperCollins/Morrow published on all e-platforms a version of Sextrology in violation of our rights and found nothing inflammatory. In fact, we find that we were ultra-kind, patient and forgiving, though rightfully alarmed and insistent, in the process of this discovery. To wit, we have been in earnest in our goal to nurture a mutually collaborative relationship with Morrow since that time. The fact is, as is also well documented by email: we didn’t even know that Sextrology was under the Morrow auspice until this event occurred.

Had we not, at the time, intercepted this illegal eBook publication by Morrow before any sales had been made (assuming no pre-sales actually were), we might all agree there would have been complication between publisher and author. By fortune or chance or call it what you will, we preempted your publication of the book. But again, it was under duress. M.C. wrote to us to say, as C.M. did years before, that HarperCollins owned the rights. And we said: Oy. We had been here before. Check your rights. This is the third time that HarperCollins/Morrow had failed to understand that the rights had been reverted to us. And still we were kind. And still we were patient. Even thought we, once again, had to have our lawyers send the proof of legal documentation.

To view the original Sabian Symbol themed 2015 Cosmic Blague corresponding to this day: Flashback! The degree pointof the Sabian Symbol will be one degree higher than the one listed for today. The Blague portrays the starting degree of for this day ( 0°,  for instance), as I typically post in the morning, while the Sabian number corresponds to the end point (1°) of that same 0°-1° period. There are 360  degrees spread over 365 or 6 days per year—so they near but not exactly correlate.

Typos happen. I don’t have a proofreader. And I like to just write, post and go!
Copyright 2020 Wheel Atelier Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Get your HAUTE ASTROLOGY 2019 Weekly Horoscope ebooks by Starsky + Cox

Capricorn 16° (January 7)

S. is doing yoga and I am not. I brought a mat with me she did not. I always think I’m going to immediately get myself together and instead my hedonistic impulses win out over my discipline. I am already spending a fortune but what are you going to do. I’m determined to curtail the eating out (this will fail too) and find some groceries today. So we head down to a place we found on the map off Commercial Street, which turns out to be a lame ass “healthfood” store; basically I leave with chestnut honey, some lettuce and a jar of sour kraut (actually I’m exaggerating for the desired effect). S. begins her pilates at midday. We ate at Essentials realizing Leila’s was closed. We had a client at six and needed to get some work done in advance. And after that we decided to go to Emile, which was delicious. I took a gorgeous picture of S. but the conversation turned. Then a funny/weird thing happened. She thought I went to the bar to pay after using the loo and I thought she was paying the check at the table. So we ended up just walking out which is ridiculous. The night ended well in any case, bonded by our shared embarrassment. The light coming into the space is truly harsh and I haven’t been able to sleep in the bedroom because I don’t like the feeling of eye masks to which I am very unused. We did hear from the LLBs and they are setting up both a meeting about some product and also putting together Venice which is very cool. The blood-letting will continue. We have to get train tickets for that. I hope my sinuses hold up okay. I also need to get the Paris Consultancy into works.

..And we are aware that in 2015-2016 Harper Collins (Morrow) published an eBook of Sextrology across every platform, foreign and domestic, on Amazon, Nook, iTunes, etc. We all also know that this was in violation of our e-rights to Sextrology which we retain.

Upon an innocent online search we discovered this, and promptly contacted you to stop it. The response we received was to the effect of: HarperCollins/Morrow owned the e-rights of Sextrology, from 2014, and were within publisher rights. We promptly wrote back to say that this was the third time in our history that your company failed to get it into your collective mind that we owned the e-rights to Sextrology, which were reverted to our company in 2015.

Just two years before, C.M. wrote us to say that we didn’t own the e-rights to Sextrology. We promptly showed him the paperwork of the rights reversion, upon which he tried to buy the rights back. We refused his offer of five thousand dollars. All of our correspondence with him, as well as our correspondence with Morrow, is fully documented.

I don’t wish to feel bad about myself but I can’t shake the blues. I suppose I should call around to see if anyone has found my poor little scarf. Then again I could totally forget about it. I think I hang on to things and substitutes for other things. I did hear back from Mike at City Winery and I think we will be able to make something happen together. I’m tired of the dead zone that O. has become. And I never understood the hostility we encounted with D.B., but never mind. I have done my best and that’s all I can do. I would like to find more of a theater type setting but perhaps this coming year we will focus purely on more musical acts and setting up shop for a kind of Joe’s to the North. I’m not sure that I can abide being in Boston anymore. It has taken its toll on me in many ways but I suppose there no use in not trying. I have to have faith in this new company that much is for certain. And I just want to be kinder to myself and others. That is a major goal. I will check in on the window replacement as that is still hanging over my head. Perhaps it is time to find a suitable little vehicle. I will put the New Hampshire cousins on the case. Why not.

To view the original Sabian Symbol themed 2015 Cosmic Blague corresponding to this day: Flashback! The degree pointof the Sabian Symbol will be one degree higher than the one listed for today. The Blague portrays the starting degree of for this day ( 0°,  for instance), as I typically post in the morning, while the Sabian number corresponds to the end point (1°) of that same 0°-1° period. There are 360  degrees spread over 365 or 6 days per year—so they near but not exactly correlate.

Typos happen. I don’t have a proofreader. And I like to just write, post and go!
Copyright 2020 Wheel Atelier Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Get your HAUTE ASTROLOGY 2019 Weekly Horoscope ebooks by Starsky + Cox

Capricorn 15° (January 6)

We had breakfast with A. at Canteen on Arnold Circus. It was kind of a boring breakfast but the waiter was handsome so that made it sort of better. I think he has a crush on A. and vice versa I’m thinking about the time we drove through France to Bourg Charente and came to a toll booth and the attendant was basically a seventeen-year-old model. Only in France. Anyway, we took a little stroll to Columbia Road with A. then back down to Bethnal Green road where we parted ways. S. has a chat with Doctor Kimberly. We skip lunch as breakfast is still with us and we are having a big dinner, probably. S. goes to get her hair did just right around the corner after we attempt to find food at Sainsbury’s (no) and on Brick Lane (also no). But I did get some pizza at Roma which will sustain me until tonight. We are feeling that maybe there is no food in this part of the city and might eventually have to go to White Chapel, which is fine, I guess. We are having dinner at Brawn tonight with P + M—we are meant to go to Emile but they are closed. They are not drinking at all but no matter. We have a lovely meal and time with them as we always do.

To view the original Sabian Symbol themed 2015 Cosmic Blague corresponding to this day: Flashback! The degree pointof the Sabian Symbol will be one degree higher than the one listed for today. The Blague portrays the starting degree of for this day ( 0°,  for instance), as I typically post in the morning, while the Sabian number corresponds to the end point (1°) of that same 0°-1° period. There are 360  degrees spread over 365 or 6 days per year—so they near but not exactly correlate.

Typos happen. I don’t have a proofreader. And I like to just write, post and go!
Copyright 2020 Wheel Atelier Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Get your HAUTE ASTROLOGY 2019 Weekly Horoscope ebooks by Starsky + Cox

Capricorn 14° (January 5)

Here first a continuation of the collection notes made:

Libra: The overarching notes above speak most directly to the Libra issue. Again we need more feel of estate landscape. This is way too perfect and symmetrical. In fact, as we’ve sometimes seen with the Scales, we might consider having the weights unequal and the entire scales image turned three-quarter to the viewer. These two tweaks (which again people have done before in rendering the scales). This might be a challenge in terms of the central column (we like the lyre topping the column). Granted, Libra is about the ideal and perfection to some degree but we think we need to walk it back a bit. The thing is that we don’t think even a Libra person might jump to wear this. It lacks power and mystery and doesn’t draw one in. It’s very mechanical. And here dovetails the conversation about rendering…is it engraved etc. Even though the scales are an inanimate sign, we need to somehow make this one more alive. 

Gemini: All your notes on Gemini are spot on. This one is definitely approach completion with all above overarching notes still being applicable. Here is a good example where from afar the overall image might even look like a skinny cow head or some creature’s (especially no. 4) but when one leans in one discovers all the detail that is going into it. There might be a fifth element to add here.

Scorpio: It really was exciting to see the work in progress of this and the next sign of Virgo because it feels more Matisse-y. You said you like the third sketch which is definitely really cool. The scorpion maybe shouldn’t be so prominent but what was accidentally stumbled upon was how the shape of the animal recalls the female reproductive system. Like the (Scorpio) Georgio O’Keefe’s skeleton animal head/jawbone likewise does! Quinn actually likes the fourth sketch though the elements are more floating and not get drawn together. But the landscape,or field feels good and we should try to infuse that somewhat where possible. 

Virgo: We totally agree with your take here. The Matisse-i-ness. The woman’s back with mortar and pestal. Again, (Carolina) living a little longer in this point in the process. We don’t want to rush to completion while still keeping a good pace but this really “illustrates” the energy and juiciness and elemental quality and the artistry and as the pendant is the “forever piece” we would do well to keep that in mind in the process and take more time and space.

I finished the tiny bit of steak and salad leftover and cleaned the house and kitchen full. Then we completely packed and that was that. We are ready to go. We Ubered to the flat in Shoreditch which is pretty much exactly as I suspected it would be. Then we strolled around the neighborhood and tried to have snacks at Albion. We ordered nuts and olives but I could see the maître d’ eating the nuts from our bowl at the chef’s station so when they arrived I asked so how were the nuts? We sent them back. We had a drink and that was on the house as well it should have been. We decided to be on the nose and go to Dishoom. I had a lamb biryani and S. had something vegetarian. I don’t think I’ll be sleeping well in the apartment and this will prove to be correct.

To view the original Sabian Symbol themed 2015 Cosmic Blague corresponding to this day: Flashback! The degree pointof the Sabian Symbol will be one degree higher than the one listed for today. The Blague portrays the starting degree of for this day ( 0°,  for instance), as I typically post in the morning, while the Sabian number corresponds to the end point (1°) of that same 0°-1° period. There are 360  degrees spread over 365 or 6 days per year—so they near but not exactly correlate.

Typos happen. I don’t have a proofreader. And I like to just write, post and go!
Copyright 2020 Wheel Atelier Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Get your HAUTE ASTROLOGY 2019 Weekly Horoscope ebooks by Starsky + Cox

Capricorn 13° (January 4)

We woke up today and worked on some notes for the collection:

We’ve had a chance to sit with Carolina’s submissions and your notes on them and get something of handle on these ourselves. First off, and not surprisingly, we three are in general agreement, as initial responses falling from our mouths matched your thoughts and feels in emails to us and in your synopses of the broader feedback you’ve already given Carolina. Below are some initial responses per the signs she’s presented, bearing in mind that the first three were more fully realized. On that note, foremost, we are in complete agreement that the vectorized perfection of the more fully realized submissions could use some walking back to varying degrees. We think that we should more fully flesh out our collective responses before getting back to Carolina after we have all three sat together on Monday morning so to galvanize our thoughts and visions here and to allow any further ideas to occur to us over the next two days.

Overarching thoughts: With focus mainly on the large pendant as the starting point for both pieces: Yes we want a little to a lot less perfection. More Matisse less Deco. Less symmetrical in some places. More mystery, drawing the viewer in. “What is that you’re wearing?” Inviting conversation. Looking closer for discover, getting a little lost inside. More “living” pieces. More organic which suits the pendant shape. We have more perfect symbols from Giulia on the back of the big pieces for contrast. A little more esoteric and elemental. The main elements given Carolina i.e. the sign symbol crab, scales, lion, virgin, etc. should not necessarily be the single most prominent. That’s the way everbody does it. It might work better and be necessary to do on the small pendant, but not on the large one which we still think should feel most like a landscape to suggest the “estate” of the sign as opposed to being an obvious take on the recognizable main symbol.

Cancer: The moon needs to be a crescent as that is the way it is symbolized—it speaks to the element of becoming and waxing and waning but also to the dark side of it (which is very Cancerian). Especially if we have a round pearl. The crab might be too prominent rather than living somewhere within the landscape, where there is more “balanced” composition of elements There are too few elements (3) and we see from our notes (and what you sent Carolina) that we did have the “ark” and the “fountain” and “the river” in addition to the pearl, crab, moon. Overall too symmetrical. As in general notes above, crab is too dominant maybe. In order to see that it is a pearl you really need the oyster/mussel/bivalve shell (although there will be a little “story” narrative of the pendant that is written and included with it in the packaging). That said Cancer is fresh water not salt water thus the river not the ocean. Maybe since the oyster shell is wavy, winding in shape it could also suggest a river? Something to consider.

So after some working on collection notes, we went for a bit of a walkabout, at least I think we did. I can’t really remember. It has not been dry January for me despite best intentions. No, that is a lie. I had no intentions on even having a dry January. In fact I’d never heard of the concept. So we went to the butcher and got ourselves a lovely steak which tasted rather livery in the end, which we simply paired with some gem lettuce. We had an appointment before hand with a client which we conducted in the salon. It was a very full day and we have to do all our packing in the morning to get ready to leave. I think the check in is around two-thirty.

To view the original Sabian Symbol themed 2015 Cosmic Blague corresponding to this day: Flashback! The degree pointof the Sabian Symbol will be one degree higher than the one listed for today. The Blague portrays the starting degree of for this day ( 0°,  for instance), as I typically post in the morning, while the Sabian number corresponds to the end point (1°) of that same 0°-1° period. There are 360  degrees spread over 365 or 6 days per year—so they near but not exactly correlate.

Typos happen. I don’t have a proofreader. And I like to just write, post and go!
Copyright 2020 Wheel Atelier Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Get your HAUTE ASTROLOGY 2019 Weekly Horoscope ebooks by Starsky + Cox

Capricorn 12° (January 3)

I had the strangest dreams last night. It involved JD and his house and chickens and foxes. The chickens thing is maybe obvious because the LLB’s have chickens and we were talking about how they “put themselves away” at night unlike geese and ducks. In the dream there were several white chickens that I suppose I owned. There was some sort of issue, too, with the law and drugs being (planted) on me. And then there were three distinct foxes, two of which were snow white, and one of which was black. All of them were cute and incredibly fluffy. One feature of the dream was that I had somehow left chickens inside JD’s house, where I had also somehow managed to get the foxes locked in. So when he came to visit his house, and we interacted even though there was a real disease about doing so—reflecting reality—I wasn’t quite in a position to go into the house and free the chickens which I imagined were roosting in the basement—I wanted to open a bulkhead unnoticed and let them out. While I had no idea where the foxes were. The black one was, specifically, mine, while the white ones were a bit more wild cards. As I write this I realize they might have been ghost foxes because, when nobody but me was looking they ran past me and out the front door squeezing easily into a crack that ran down the center of it. As if they were ghosts. Which they weren’t not I suppose. But really who the hell knows. We had breakfast—they no longer do cooked version here which is too bad because it used to be wonderful—and got packed and ready to head to the train station. The train itself was a much better version of the one on which we traveled to Scotland. So that was a small merci. I got some work done but not a lot, but at least it didn’t feel endless.

We got back to Myddelton Square, dropped our bags and headed for dinner at Brother Marcus post train. I order a gin and tonic which I don’t normally drink, but my time with the LLB’s still lingers. The waiter is Italian. I speak to him in it. I must be drunker of this one g+t then I thought. The food is very snack and delicious. I want to live in London. I’m pretty tired of my life on the other side of the pond. I will need to move my series to another location. I’m going to talk to City Winery and see what I might effect. I will write to Mike there. I will end up writing him for sure. I need to get Ellie off the list.

I need to reassess also the whole Scapes conversation and decide on whether to jewelry or not to jewelry. I fear that having not done a Christmas show last year that we won’t ever do one but I am going to see where that energy goes in the coming months. The summer should really tell us what’s what. As book plans have changed I need to refocus energy and rework my schedule. Soon I will be able to focus this Blague back on its original ways and means. The house cleaning soon begins. I’m glad we will miss the winter in New England as it is just too much to bear. I am going to make this a most fruitful year on every level. I know I don’t need to worry. Because, as we often say: If you’re worrying you’re not working (and by that we mean functioning). I need to be something of a beacon now and make this time about health and healing.

To view the original Sabian Symbol themed 2015 Cosmic Blague corresponding to this day: Flashback! The degree pointof the Sabian Symbol will be one degree higher than the one listed for today. The Blague portrays the starting degree of for this day ( 0°,  for instance), as I typically post in the morning, while the Sabian number corresponds to the end point (1°) of that same 0°-1° period. There are 360  degrees spread over 365 or 6 days per year—so they near but not exactly correlate.

Typos happen. I don’t have a proofreader. And I like to just write, post and go!
Copyright 2020 Wheel Atelier Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Get your HAUTE ASTROLOGY 2019 Weekly Horoscope ebooks by Starsky + Cox

Capricorn 11° (January 2)

The last bits of last night were definitely a bit of a blur. After the night in with Jax and Larry singing cabaret songs and laughing our assess off for hours on end, then the next eve of New Year, and last night’s rather unexpected group party after an afternoon debauch, this morning was probably the puffiest if not the outright roughest. To be fair I felt fine, but the first thing JLB said at breakfast was that this was the first morning she didn’t get away with it. I felt bad because I knew she was the one driving and that isn’t always fun or easy. And there was that bridge to tackle. We set out directly and we got over it, literally. We had a huggy goodbye at the airport. Of course even the guy monitoring the rental car drop offs knew who LLB was. Everyone does. I realize that probably ore people recognize him than do Jo. I think people think they know him. And really he is exactly on television as he is in life. Again, that authenticity. Post hugs we jumped a tram and got off in the West End. It was pretty rainy but we managed to roll our bags all the way to the Edinburgh Residence. I think I spied the area where, on our first trip to town, we had supper. I’ve tried since to find this place so I figured I had it wrong. We dropped our stuff. The room was similar to one we’ve stayed in before but on a lower floor. We just dropped our bags and headed out for lunch and sure enough that road did contain the restaurant I’d been trying to refind all this time, along with a few others that looked good, plus the florist from which we always have flowers sent to the Murrays. Ironically, we first chose another restaurant across the road to go to because it looked more our collective speed—kind of a Frenchy wine bar. But there were a few things off about the place. For one the table(s) at the back had crap all over it as if the owner or staff were doing their accounting. I can’t stand that kind of mess. We did have a waitress come over before we were ready and then it took a very long time for her to return. In the meantime there was this couple at a hightop behind us. She disappeared and he got on Facetime or whatever with his child. Typically, that is a short conversation, but not this one. As I tried to read the menu which had minuscule type all I heard was this whiny child’s voice coming loudly through the phone and it wouldn’t stop. I thought I was annoyed but even more than me it seemed S. was having none of it, so off we went. Outside was the young wife smoking a cigarette and she rather manaically wished us a Happy New Year. Both she and hubby inside talking to the baby monster seemed pathologically knowing that they were annoying. So back we went to the old haunt I once tried to find.

There was hardly anyone in there but these handsome Scottish men, tall as trees, with reddish tanned faces, in expensive cashmere v-neck sweaters over slim physiques centered on the balls of their feet. We found a table in the back and realized that one had to go to the bar, as one does, to order what they wanted. I was worried it was too much a pub for S. but it would turn out that I was wrong. We went and ordered, she a very good glass of red wine and a soup which was meant to be butternut squash. I inquired about the mussels—they were out of them—so I ordered a steak and vegetable pie. I had a choice of chips or potatotes (aren’t chips potatoes?) I said potatoes and then I had a choice between something I didn’t understand and gravy. Gravy please. And I ordered a pint of something made in Edinburgh which had an Italian name that started with a P. And we got some chili rice crackers which we carried back to the table with our drinks. By the time the food arrived the place was absolutely packed which was very reassuring because we suddenly realized this was the place to be and it was going to be good. People next to us were talking about medicine and science, on the other side of us was a pretty well heeled family. The food arrived. The “mug” of soup was the side of a small planter and it wasn’t butternut squash it was beetroot—“is that okay?”—yes it was. And there was my pie, all flaky crust with molten meaty interior. I don’t really remember eating a vegetable other than a small, whole mushroom cap. The potatoes were only slightly smashed and molded into a small circular mound; and I assumed I should pour the small pitcher of gravy on them which I did. The whole thing was delicious. When we first arrived we headed downstairs because that’s where I remember eating last time. This must have been fifteen years ago. But they weren’t serving down there. So I was truly concerned this was going to be too pubby an experience, what with the framed sports tunics and other tributes to Scottish manhood. But it was pretty much run by pretty young women and it was so charming and so not off-putting or weird or alientating (that feeling of bullying) that places like this can look and be.

We did no strolling around but headed right back to the Residence and took paths and S. fell asleep. I sort of dozed off but I had that feeling you get when you’re so weirdly overtired. You know the one? When it almost feels dangerous to fall asleep. That you’re going to miss the sleep off-ramp and land directly into death. I was revived enough to throw on clothes and head down stairs in advance for a gin tonic which took so long to come it was only placed in front of me when S. arrived and we were meant to head off. This is something which doesn’t not happen to me. It would be “my luck.” But it was cool. I pretty much downed it and then we set off to the one restaurant where we could get a reservation, doing a little detour along the way to see if the place we really wanted to go to had a cancellation. The place had like five tables so that was a no go. So we continued on and I’m glad we did. We made it east to Thistle Street to Café St. Honore and declined the table by the door they had waiting and asked for the one a departing twosome had just left vacant. S. had two appetizers, smoked salmon tartare and beetroot salad; I had goat cheese salad and a rainbow trout with veg and endive. It sounds real simple and it was which was exactly what was called for. We had a lovely Chinon and a lemon almond cake with crème fraiche. I really wanted to take some pictures on the way home but I convinced myself that I would get out in advance of leaving in the morning and take some shots. That was definitely not meant to be.

To view the original Sabian Symbol themed 2015 Cosmic Blague corresponding to this day: Flashback! The degree pointof the Sabian Symbol will be one degree higher than the one listed for today. The Blague portrays the starting degree of for this day ( 0°,  for instance), as I typically post in the morning, while the Sabian number corresponds to the end point (1°) of that same 0°-1° period. There are 360  degrees spread over 365 or 6 days per year—so they near but not exactly correlate.

Typos happen. I don’t have a proofreader. And I like to just write, post and go!
Copyright 2020 Wheel Atelier Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Get your HAUTE ASTROLOGY 2019 Weekly Horoscope ebooks by Starsky + Cox

Capricorn 10° (January 1)

Well I felt better this morning than I truly had a right to. The LLBs met us for breakfast and I had the same greasy meat. We were meant to be back at Jo’s for brunch anytime after 11:30 or something. When we got there we were really the last to arrive. The guy that plays the detective character was there (I realized it was him later). And all the boat people were there. And Willy who was at the party last night of course and with whom I really had a lovely time (reverse foreshadowing) despite the fact the last time I saw her she sort of came for me which was unfortunate. She’s sort of done it before and I really do need to ignore it. Was lovely to see the kids of course and John and David and the whole lot. I had a bagel and some smoked salmon and then we went for a lovely long walk in the wet and green. I had a lovely chat with Aine whom I really hadn’t gotten to connect with much yet on the trip. The LLBs didn’t join on the walk as they threatened they wouldn’t due to footwear issues or just the fact they didn’t want to. Willy was overheard saying that she hates walking outside or something. So more foreshadowing. Scotland really is the most magical place on the planet I must say. We got back to the house and I texted LLBs to “come back,” and learned that Larry had invited the peeps from the hotel, Karen and Kenny to dinner with us (he is a political journalist like the other boat guys), and also J. and F. which was really great as we hadn’t really seen them much. J. was definitely one of the more in cups of the partygoers last night but she seemend perfectly fine today. I really love them and enjoy their company immensely. We were asked if we wanted hot toddies which, you know what, I never knew what went into one. Pretty much everybody had them. I couldn’t believe the Edinburgh crowd drove home last night after the party and then back again today for the brunch. The plan was to then seem them tomorrow when we ourselves get to town. I told Laurence that we had to invite Aine which of course we did, so now we were going to be nine peeps instead of eight which would be fine; but much to my delight and surprise J said she’d like to join with N of course and also Willy and her new fellow. How to explain to the hotel that we would now be thirteen for dinner.

We arrived back at the Townhouse and went straight to break the news in hopes of hearing it would be no problem. It wasn’t not a problem. It took a lot of cajoling and convincing. Finally it came down to furniture and we said we’d bring tables and chairs from our rooms. We got a reluctant yes. The LLBs had already been set up in the bar while we were out for our long country constitutional. Larry had some Guinness and champagne going—a black velvet it is apparently called. I could retch just thinking about it; but of course Jax didn’t have anything because apparently in Scotland they throw the book at you for even the slightest bit of alcohol in your system, which must come from being a very alcoholic culture to begin (and end) with. Anywig, we never even made it upstairs but instead sat in the lounge, the couples, on sofas, facing one another, whilst Karen (half of the other couple, with Kenny) sat in an armchair diagonally facing us. For nearly four hours she sat and listened to us like she was binge-watching a series. The four of us recounted our stories, sort of at, one another, filling in the gaps on stories, reminding each other of things that never made it to longterm memory. Finally Karen said we should all write a book together, which is something I can imagine easily happening. It is difficult for me to sustain a thought right now as I am writing this from about two weeks out, trying to play catch up once again. There is a pattern here: when I encounter any kind of mini trauma or setback my work tends to go out the window. I am sitting here right now in a flat we’ve rented in London and the upstairs neighbors are so loud it’s hard to concentrate. We had a lousy couple of days at the end of last week, leading into the weekend, and it has been hard to recover. I am going to spend as much of this day just sitting here writing and doing little else so that I can pick up what pieces are still available to me. So many have been lost. It is the way it goes I suppose. I am trying not to hang on but instead to move forward. I still have my health which sometimes I think is a miracle. Anyway back to what I was saying. So this went, as I said, for about four hours, and we went up to change and refreshen as best as we could. When we arrived back down Kenny had emerged and we sat down to a new bottle of wine they were now serving (Karen had the benefit of ours the whole time). Not long after J and N and guests arrived and we all settled down to a lovely dinner. The food is wonderful in this place. I was seated across from Willy who at one point said “Hillary Clinton really fucked up.” Knowing she is something of a Bernie Bros. and that she has baited me in the past over stuff (not to mention that she is a good friend to a good friend of mine) I said politely that, well, actually she won the popular vote against all odds—corruption, voter booth tampering, rolls purging, hacking, and the larger insidiousness of foreign, Russian interference. But, truly, it is misogyny that was the main weapon used against her. This was argued for awhile. Then I said that women in all cultures are really the most maligned and disenfranchised of people and made the mistake of saying (because I thought we would beyond the question of my being able to say this or not) that “woman is the n-word of the world,” a valid prospect to be discussed. Forgettaboutit. W said that we can’t talk about the oppression of women without discussing the notion of race; I said I disagreed: that we can certainly talk about the oppression of women in its own right as it is to varying degrees a problem in all cultures, including our own. It was a rabbit hole and we were both terriers digging into it, for too long, neither one of us conceding. Until finally I moved to the other end of the table where the topic was no lighter: the notion of transgenderism in the face of newest wave feminism and the shadowside of terfism. The night did not end on the cheeriest of notes I must say. And I was told in coming days that I told the same story of our (friends) meeting in the course of twenty minutes without knowing it. The multiple nights (and days) of partying had indeed caught up to me.

To view the original Sabian Symbol themed 2015 Cosmic Blague corresponding to this day: Flashback! The degree pointof the Sabian Symbol will be one degree higher than the one listed for today. The Blague portrays the starting degree of for this day ( 0°,  for instance), as I typically post in the morning, while the Sabian number corresponds to the end point (1°) of that same 0°-1° period. There are 360  degrees spread over 365 or 6 days per year—so they near but not exactly correlate.

Typos happen. I don’t have a proofreader. And I like to just write, post and go!
Copyright 2020 Wheel Atelier Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Get your HAUTE ASTROLOGY 2019 Weekly Horoscope ebooks by Starsky + Cox  

Capricorn 9° (December 31)

With still some other Blague entries left undone, I have four to do to catch up on so to coincide with the present day. This will be a difficult challenge but I have decided to be up to it and get right up to speed. There is much to do in the new year; even more so there is much to be. I will find out that a friend who always comes to see our show at Joe’s was disappointed that we didn’t perform this year so she bought tickets to Sandra Bernhard instead only to report back that the show was boring and didn’t hold a candle to ours in terms of entertainment. In the past I might find a comment like that to be rather hard to believe but I am now of the mind to accept comments like this as truisms. I think the apologies I have made for myself are indeed now a thing of he past. I must turn the corner on so much of it. I will reach out to that guy Peter M. in coming days because he and I do have some overlap, being that he also produces artists. But things like this often prove to be disappointing. There is always that little bit of ego that crops in. Well not always but most often. After spending days with lovely friends the last thing I need is attitude from competitive strangers and the grandstanding that characterizes the underconfident. Boring. I am remembering the good and loving and supportive energy that I am blessed to enjoy in this life and I am not letting the rest of it get me down, so help me. So back to the story at hand on this day…

Okay so last night was fine-ish. But around five a.m. I was awakened from a dead sleep thinking S. was up and about doing this and that. Turned out the people in the next room, with whom we shared a paper wall, decided to unleash a bull that richocheted around there room. It was awful and after last night it was the last thing I needed. It happened again around seven then again around nine, not that we fell back from five because we did not. S. was having none of it and beelined downstairs to demand a different room only to return deflated because they didn’t have one. Being the New Year, people had rooms booked for months if not from a year ago. We said we would meet for a late breakfast that goes until ten so we headed down at nine forty five and Jax had said that Larry was still snoring so I expected her. Instead he came down looking highly reluctant and made shaking motions to signal his nerves were a bit shot from last night’s fun. I had the meatiest, greasiest breakfast I could order. Jax didn’t surface–something about her hair. L. brought her up a giant eggs Benedicte. Despite S. being shot down I managed to convince the staff to let us change rooms. So I spent the morning bathing and packing. I think S. had some appointment. We then met up again with the LLBs for lunch—we put our name down at three lemons—and went for a walk. People stopped to ask me to take pictures of LLB of course. There was some shoe shopping. And we all had to get bits and bobs and the pharmacy; and LLB needed more gin for his room. At lunch we ran into friends we would have expected to meet. And we talked about going to Venice together as the LLBs are regulars on that scene and we have never been.

I really didn’t intend to drink at lunch but all bets seem to be off and I followed Larry and had a stout. And then another. The girls shared a bottle of wine. We then went to our rooms to dress for the evening. I thought I said this but we met up with the mythological other couple attending the party (obviously they were in costumes) and all shared a car. The party itself was really fun. Stomp and Queen (with Adam Lambert) performed. I stayed pretty sober most of the evening but toward the end, when it was time to do some dancing, I let loose a bit. I always seem to encounter Neil B and his wife toward the end of these parties and I mentioned I was leaving my whole kit at the party which I did. Earlier on D. N. hung around with us and I honestly couldn’t understand anything he was saying. He seemed totally together but was obviously really quite drunk. No physical change in his behavior but his words were just so random. The whole theme worked well (being inside an H.G. Wells novel, really); and to be honest I don’t remember much of the ride home although I do remember giving my critique of the whole concept of repackaging Queen. Like you wouldn’t recast John Lennon and George Harrison and call it The Beatles featuring, oh I dunno, Chris Martin and Thom Yorke.

To view the original Sabian Symbol themed 2015 Cosmic Blague corresponding to this day: Flashback! The degree pointof the Sabian Symbol will be one degree higher than the one listed for today. The Blague portrays the starting degree of for this day ( 0°,  for instance), as I typically post in the morning, while the Sabian number corresponds to the end point (1°) of that same 0°-1° period. There are 360  degrees spread over 365 or 6 days per year—so they near but not exactly correlate.

Typos happen. I don’t have a proofreader. And I like to just write, post and go!
Copyright 2019 Wheel Atelier Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Get your HAUTE ASTROLOGY 2019 Weekly Horoscope ebooks by Starsky + Cox