Virgo 7° (August 29)

In the intro we must make a case for working with archetype, and I want to schedule in that intro writing after I hit my marks today. Athena “armed wisdom.” If gods are disunited there is return to chaos, they are proud susceptible and vain, cunning and intelligent. Along comes an energy more rational, capable of unity, constructing peace, on the side of reason not passion. From the first wife Metis prudence and cunning. Gaia and Uranus warn Zeus that after she gives birth to a daughter she will bear a son that will dethrone him. He does his trick of swallowing her, playing a game of metamorphese, on the verge of giving bith to her: Armed and helmeted letting out a war cry, striking fear. Prudence and wisdom of mother, intelligence of father. His fave forgiving everything. Given to Triton the river god raised with his daughter Pallas. During combat training Athena kills her involuntarily, Pallas distracted by Zeus’s appearing, fearing Athena’s safety. Lost sister, places her name before her own, homage to her. Dazzling beauty but determined to stay virgin. Hephaestus relentlessly pursues her. She orders weapons which he says he’ll do for love of her. Poseidon, her rival, tells Hephaestus that she wants him so when she comes to collect her weapons he pounces on her. She gets away he catches up and tears her garment exposes her body and basically shoots his wad which lands on her leg and, in disgust, she wipes off with a scrap of wool, throwing it on the ground, unknowingly impregnating Gaia, her great grandmother who gives birth to Erichthonius, half human half snake baby boy, whose name derives from the Greek word for wool, the Ram’s sheepish association duly noted. Gaia rejects him in horror so Athena adopts him and loves him so fiercely the gods all believe it’s really her child. Relate to snake goddesses in notes. Three daughers of Cecrops, king of Attica, her priestesses, were put in charge of his care when Athena was otherwise engaged but they were told not to look inside the basket; curiosity got the better of two of them and they opened the box and went insane from fright and threw themselves from the Acropolis.

Zeus puts forth a decree that all the gods must claim a patron city. Attica is fought over by Poseidon and Athena, rivals from the get go. It is the most civilized place in Greece with no human sacrifice, law courts, and mandates for marriage and monogamy. It is not only a democracy but women have the right to vote. Poseidon offers and creates a lake of saltwater for leisure and water sports and a warhorse, a black stallion for the king, entertainment and war. Athena offers the useful gift of the olive whose leaves never fall and whose fruit will feed and fuel the people, a symbol of peace (still is) and fertility. She wins, carried along by the women’s vote. Poseidon is bitter and hateful (a side of Pisces we will explore), but Athena offered peace and agriculture. Erichthonius becomes the first king. Athena becomes the patron of heroes, Perseus gifting her with the Medusa’s head for her help, which she wears on her breastplate. The Trojan horse is her idea, she helps Odysseus, Telemachus and allows Prometheus entry to steal the proverbial fire. She inspires audacity and clearheadedness in humans, a new form of bravery guided by reflection and cunning, not disorganized, blind fury, associated with Ares, her opposite. 

Intelligence in the service of war for peace instead of the extermination of the enemy. She is guide of heros. Protectress of the state, the first palacial god, laws and their correct application. w/out prosperity laws alone are not enough She gives men the plough and yoke. Also teaches numbers and women the culinary arts with weaving and spinning. Oversees shipbuilding, how to work wood (he he) as she is goddess of the helm. She oversees the construction of the Argo which sets out for the golden fleece, from the Ram who is the constellation of Aries. She is often in contest, that is a hint of her mythology. Arachne hangs herself in remorse for boasting after Athena, in a rare mood, breaks the place up in a rage. Athena puts a balm on her corpse and turns here into a spider, an arachnid, forever hanging as was the girls choice and forever weaving which is Athena’s decree.

The following blocks of text are exceprts from my first year of  Blagues, nos. 761-765. I am reading through all of my Blagues, five per day, and posting some samples here. Now, in my sixth year of writing this Blague, by the time I get to my seventh, I will have journeyed through all the daily Blagues of my first five years. If that’s confusing I apologize. Year seven, I’ll only have to read through year six, once a day. 

Let’s talk biz too. The nutshell on my journalistic career is this.My real name is Wm. Leone for starters and I was a journalist and editor in my youth while trying to launch an acting career. Most people wait tables. I ultimately did that too, at the Bell Caffee on Spring Street. But that’s a long story, being a gender bendy 90s neo hippy hangout near Don Kings. Waiters wouldn’t show up and sometimes i ran the whole restuarant—easy a 100 customers by myself wearing shorty Hawaiian print bathing trunks, with work boots and a slicker throwing parties with Penny Arcade and Chris Tanner and Quentin Crisp and so many others back in the day. I was intermittently on Broadwy while working there three years. Before going deep into freelance mode.Before all that, my first magazine job was at Passion in Paris (run by Robert Sarner) in 1985 1986 I wrote things about micobiological farm markets and singers at Le Palace but mainly, speaking friench, I answered phones and used our trade with clubs to party with my friends who in Paris then included Jo Rowling and jackie and laurence llewelyn bowen and susan tide frater all still closest friends.Then I moved to NYC in 1987 and worked for Judy Price at Avenue magazine on their side more style magazine called On The Avenue. That world include Joan Krone and Andrew Willis (is that his name) and great photogrphers Joseph Carne, Steven Klein with baby Kristy models. It was culture shock there so I left to work at two magazines simultaneously. I founded DV8 which was fabulous and all the club kids worked for us circulating the magazine at Tunnel and The World and the like. I was editor there and also Managing Editor working for Howard Jacoby with Lisa Kenndy, Lynn Geller, Jim Mullen,  Donald Shruggs, Peter McQuaid, Glenn O’Brien. Mainly people did a lot of coke while I put the magazine together.I wrote for Paper and Detour and then my acting work took off a bit in between the Bell Cafee, two shows on Broadway, then back to journalism this time Working as a reporter for Instyle, also producing FAshion TV segments for City TV Toronto which also did Ohh La La with Laurie PIke. I wrote for slew of magazines then like Paper, Glue, Stop, The Face, Cosmopolitan and runway reports that took me to Paris and Milan for Madmoiselle, Glamour, YM eventually TimeOut, The New York Obersver, and The New York Times but something was lurkingLynne cum Stella and I were already deep into astrology. She was working for designers in Paris and Milan which is really why I sought writing gigs there.That and the fact the runways were riddled with Supermodels and I was consious of being in the right place at the right time. Anyway after her and my work in Paris or Milan folks would come over and get a reading from us. Big people in magazines like Sally Singer and Brana Wolf and a slew of executive editors, one at Teen People who asked us to create a his/her horoscope column. We did. it was a huge hit everybody was reading it. Adults I mean. One was Rob Weisbach who offered us a book deal which eventually become a Harper Collins book SEXTROLOGY , followed years later by Cosmic Coupling.While writing books I because an A NIght Out With columnist in the STyles section of Times and also wrote for the ART section of the Boston Globe. Then Tyler Brule left Wallpaper and Lynne and I were brought over together by Time Inc to act as executive editors —this was 2003, before the books were published and, once they were, we went through a long period being written about though now came out of the closet as astrologers and wrote features and horoscope columns under our new pseudonyms for British Vogue, Paris Vogue, Glamour, German Glamour, Bolero, Style.Co./Vogue/ Vanity Fair, Cosmo, Elle, on and on and on. We even thought we could make a go with a horoscope in Star but couldn’t work with Bonnie Fuller and Joe Dolce just couldn’t make that work…..

So then Starsky + Cox took over. We were performing an act as such; We had two books and columns culminating in being the Astrologers for the Daily Beast, something Newseek readers were freaked out about. But we had many firsts. They way we skewed the subject of astrology was in a sophiscticated sometime glam direction. Our book launches were at Barneys where Simon did Sextrology windows which was so sweet……..

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Typos happen—I don’t have time or an intern to edit.*

To view the original Sabian Symbol themed 2015 Cosmic Blague corresponding to this day: Flashback! The degree point of the Sabian Symbol may at times be one degree higher than the one listed here. 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 365/6 days per year—so they nearly, 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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