Monday 14 January 2008

WEEK AHEAD

Aries
While you’re waiting on the big stuff don’t sweat the small stuff, Aries. If you start feeling crotchety come Wednesday and into the weekend try and see it as just a small side effect of the growing pains you’re going through. You’re changing man, you know you are. And the way we change is by being stimulated to change - people around you, or events, or aspects of your nature suddenly throw you a curve ball and you have to deal with it. Calmly. So this week, when the frustration arises just name it twice and let it go. ‘Frustration, frustration’. (Or ‘Dougal, Dougal’ whichever you prefer.) Don’t snipe at the parking attendant, pull violently ill faces at your lover’s Christmas bulge, or stick a piece of pre-jammed toast to the underside of the table in the work cafeteria. Be blithe. Surprise yourself.

Taurus
Money is in the frame this week Bull. There seems there may be an ideal solution to how you can work, succeed, and become well paid for your sterling services after all - a dream job, a promotion overseas, an extended contract. You may have to let go of something to get it though and that can be tricky for you but remember, nothing comes for nothing. Suck it up, Bully, it'll be worth it. One caveat: any extra lucre won’t be with you until at least early February so get your piggy bank in order now. The big bills - the Christmas organic turkey and luxury crackers you squashed onto the credit card and the settee you bought on interest free credit in 1998 - are all coming due at the end of the month. On a happy note you’ve three lovely weekends to look forward to. This one dreaming of work success; the next two with hubba hubba in mind…

Gemini
What do women mean to you, Gemini? What do they reeeally mean? Are they all mothers, ideal 1950s ladies in pastel skirts and Doris Day hairdos? Is that what they are? The answer is no. The answer is you need to have a long think about how you feel about your mother and ergo, why you are projecting your feelings for your mother onto the women in your life (or yourself if you’re a girl Gemini). Goddam it. Review it. Work it out. Let go of it. Out of this reverie a wholly unconnected BIG IDEA smacks you between the eyes on Friday. Eureka! It’s a thought, a good thought, the type that holds water… but it needs time to brew. Write it down, pencil some down time on a beach/canal/floatation tank to revisit it on 6 and 28 March, then get back to the Mother love. Be your own vision of a mother, Gemini, stick plasters on your own damn verrucae and buy your own pants – and give all women the right to be feisty and flawed and yet perfect.

Cancer
The week starts well Cancer until Tuesday when Blam! You’re back on edge again wondering where the next hungry shark is going to spring from. Now I’m not one of those people who insists that the past doesn’t exist. Of course it does. How else would I be wearing this fabulous silk blouse that I bought last month? My point is that in the past things happened. Perhaps you were that kid who peed himself in assembly in front of the whole school because Mr Davies singled you out for a royal rollicking in the middle of prayers. The cold truth is that Mr Davies had his own issues and was probably a lonely, self-asphyxiating, self-handler. I can’t impress upon you enough how amazing and powerful the relationships in your life can be – even within the space of a month. Please please please work out what fearful event and which bully is still messing with your head and then let them out. When you fall in love and make it work, you’ll have won the game.

Leo
Favourite puss, three things to say to you. Be clear, be carefree, be steady on your wonga. Be Clear: especially where loves and close business colleagues are concerned. If you’ve got something to say – or more likely they have – then make as much effort as you can to ensure a clear dialogue. Ecoutez et repetez pussy cat. Be sure you ‘av ‘eard, what dey av zed – ozzerwaz zere weel be zom rrreeeeal prrroblems in Februarrry. Comprends? Be Carefree: Venus is beckoning you in her sumptuous gown and pom pom slippers to be fluffy. Enjoy. Enjoy. Wonga: Money is likely to be tight for sometime, though not necessarily in surprising ways. Don’t bury your head because things don’t feel too bad and go on clothing yourself in ermine. The pinch is coming in May. Make sure it doesn’t take your arm off.

Virgo
The emphasis for the rest of the month, and into February, is work Virgo and you know that makes you happy. If you’re ready to change jobs an opportunity and/or a clearer picture of where you’d like to be heading and who you’d like to working for is set to arrive this Friday. (Circle March 6th and 28th as follow ups to this week’s signals then see what happens. Ooh spooky.) Then on Saturday you’ll find yourself filled with the gumption and self-belief it takes to go for what you want – creativity, lovers, children… Saturn, the poker-faced Don of the University of Life, is on a reading break and is slouching round the corridors in his casuals ignoring all his stoodents. So make time for frivolity - make love in the bushes, make sandcastles, or even babies if ya wanna.

Libra
Who you want to be when you grow up may be a question you still ask yourself from time to time. Certainly it may feel like you wish to God that someone would please ring the school bell so that at last the responsibilities would end for a while, at least until tomorrow, at least until you’ve had time to ride your bike in the park and then rush home with scuzzy knees to fish fingers for tea. It is not so hard to ease this ache, my dear friend. Instead of resenting the here and now and how it cruelly prevents you from being on a tropical island in a hammock with nothing to do but watch the horizon all day – take action! Mid-week plan something stoopid for the weekend. Get kids involved, the neighbours, your brothers and sisters and their kids. Play pooh sticks off a bridge into a shipping lane. Do roly-polies down a grassy hill and land head first in a muddy puddle. Then spit spot Michael! Hurry home to a hot, soapy hand wash and fish fingers by the fire for tea.

Scorpio
By now you must be able to feel the tide preparing to turn. It feels deep and distant but within a month you’ll be able to taste it, like sea spray on your tongue. The control that money, and more importantly other people’s money, has had over you will be changing for the rest of your life. The freedom is coming, and being a sensi, you’ll have felt it in your waters way back. But steady. The temptation in the next few weeks may be to get drunk on the freedom and demob happy with your cash. Beware of spending like a lone sailor on port leave. This isn't like your lotto numbers coming up (or your ship coming in to thrash the analogy to within a finger nail of its life). It’s not that sort of change. Bide your time a little while longer. Spend time listening to your mum (even if she's makes less sense than a turnip god bless her), go over what of your father’s emotional garbage heap is not actually yours. Recognise the beauty in your everyday life.

Sagittarius
Love is all around you Sag, but so the feeling grows may not be your personal experience of this. Love can be cozy, ya know, take comfort in that if your ardour may not be at its usually peak. Lust needs a holiday too. How good does a roast loin of pork taste when you’ve not had a Sunday dinner for weeks? Pretty damn tasty. So snuggle. It’s only a temporary glitch. If you’re feeling physically squidgy after Christmas keep hitting the gym and you’ll be hot as Bondi beach again soon enough. At the weekend splash the cash like you love to. Get the rounds in. You can afford to spoil your team mates once in a while. Buy a lotto ticket and make a wish. Treat yourself to something you’ve always wanted but never felt you deserved. Like a bow and arrow. Or a horse.

Capricorn
You should be learning to love yourself by now Goat. Not the staring in the mirror sort of sucking your stomach in sort of loving yourself, but really recognising your worth. Whether ‘they’ have piped down and ridden off to torment some other poor self-doubter or whether you’ve come to realise that ‘they’ don’t know what the fig ‘they’ are talking about so have just stopped listening doesn’t matter a jot. The point is that right about now you must be getting a funny feeling in your gutsy wuts that things are going rather well, if truth be told, and that you may actually be really rather responsible for that particular and pleasing turn of events. Even people behind the scenes are starting to look to you in awe. Spot those knowing glances at the coffee machine. Your commitment to your constant improvement is legendary. If you’ve been doing what stalwart Goaties do, and focussing on scaling your very own personal mountain, it is now paying off. ‘They’ have probably all collapsed from altitude sickness. Onwards, Goat. To the top for you.

Aquarius
This is always one of the hardest weeks of the year for you and it’s not helped by Mars, the planet of many things but primarily male thrusty behaviour, taking a time out in your house of love affairs and creativity. Aside from that, you can probably feel a vague sense of dread as Pluto, the demolition ball of the zodiac, drifts up the corridor towards your secret room. He’s been threatening this for years and now he means business. The thing is, it’s the stuff we hide and don’t try to remedy that is our biggest undoing. An overzealous session with a pan stick is no way to great the world, metaphorically speaking. So let it out. Talk about the stuff you don’t like so much about yourself. Let it out in the safety zone of your friends. Get some comfort from the people who love you as you are, heap of neuroses or no. The changes that are coming will set you free. But you have to let them.

Pisces
And so the truth will out, fish. Either it’s someone who’s got something to say about the way you are and the way you’re dancing your dance. Or it’s someone wanting you to say something that you don’t really feel ready to say just now. Or it’s a secret of yours that’s bubbling to the surface and you aren’t ready to let it break the surface. Whichever it is, it won’t be over til the fat lady opens her trap and spits it out. But going to get spat it is. If you’re planning to wait it out you should get the chance to set matters straight but not until mid March - so pack a lot of sandwiches. And just for the record, if you want to carp behind someone’s back this week, watch out. It’ll bite you where it hurts sure as eggs is eggs and just when you least expect it.