h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

As to the first question about the symbols, there's a page you can link to from the atelier index page called "basics" that lists the basic sets of glyphs --
http://www.bonitovalley.com/astro/basics1.htm

Astrology books for beginners: there are several kinds. There's what we call "cookbooks", which lavish paragraphs on each planet's house or sign position, and those are ok to start with. But they are dangerous in that they imply hard and fast rules for interpretation at a very basic level.

I recommend getting this, the llewellyn planetary guide:
http://www.llewellyn.com/bookstore/book.php?pn=J726

It has some introductory stuff in the front and then there are ephemerides in the back (those are logs of the planets' projected positions through the coming year), and then for each day it shows all the aspects and sometimes adds commentary. There's no substitute for ~watching~ the movement of points in your chart and seeing what has an effect and what doesn't. You'll notice that the guide is on sale, it being the new year already.

They also have _Astrology for Beginners_ at about half-price, and it looks like it's not just a cookbook. I haven't seen it, but you can't beat that price.
http://www.llewellyn.com/bookstore/book.php?pn=H106

*pouring another round of wine*

And I'll be right here for anybody who wants to ask about ephemerides and such.

I wish there was a way to kick Freddy's interfering backside.

Mercury is a about 4 degrees of Aquarius at the moment, and freddying. You can check the position out in your chart and see what house Freddie is in and whether he is leaning on the natal position of planets in your chart.

Freddie is a major pain this year, but I'm trying not to let him get the best of me. Both he and Venus are in my sun sign. Does that have any particular significance, Lil?

Rather they are in my sun sign on my birth chart. Obviously not now.

*sips *

For those interested, I've put Gwen's chart up and also put up a chart showing the current positions of the planets -- current as of this afternoon, anyway. This is known as a transit chart, cast to find out about the transition of the planets, rather than a birth chart.

Gw7en has Sun conjunct Mercury, so Freddie events will always be more noticeable for her! The current Mercury position is early in Aquarius, which falls in Gw7en's 2nd house, that of resources -- which of course includes earnings....

Before you find a bridge to jump off, remember that Freddies are actually good for ~some~ things, like review and revision, or repeating a process that didn't go right or succeed the first time. And people born with retrograde Mercury may have completely opposite or off-the-wall events or experiences during these times.

My personal experience of retrogrades of Merc is that I suddenly reach out and communicate with friends in other parts of the world right when Merc slows to a halt, and then I get into research of some kind.

I launched this project in 2004, and here I am actually returning to it and doing homework! During a Freddie.

Since I'm using this opportunity to switch career paths, I'm avoiding the bridge and trying to take advantage of Freddie, Lil. I'll let you know how that goes.

I've tried to post here several times, and every time something happens and my post gets eaten.

The new Smithsonian has Charles Darwin and Abraham Lincoln on the cover with the tag "Darwin and Lincoln: Born on the same day 200 years ago, they changed the world forever."

And back then, in a world with a vastly smaller population, being born on the same day was more significant!

I didn't realize they were born on the same day, so the cover immediately caught my attention. It makes me wonder which other famous people were born on the same day. Things like this must be interesting to astrologers.

It's only with the advent of personal computers that software was written for erecting charts and suddenly it became possible to whip up a chart in seconds. Before that, doing a chart was the work of a whole morning or afternoon, referencing tables of latitude and ephemerides and hand-interpolating the positions of planets. And that was with the cheap calculators that came onto the market in the early 70's.

When you can do a chart in the blink of an eye, it becomes easy to do a LOT of charts, and there's software out there that does statistical comparisons, can tell you all the people in your database that have Venus at 13 degrees of Leo and so forth, whatever you want to do research on.

This in turn has made it possible to do some realistic research into the likely effect of the positions of things in a chart. The effort is still very young, but it is revolutionizing the practise. And you still need too know how to hand-cast a chart if you do one of the college degrees.

But wait! There's more! Here's a website that will find YOUR birth twin, if you have one:

http://www.astrologyguidance.com/ast-twin.shtml

I'm going to submit an application, and I'll let you know if there are any results. You are probably helping the website owner do their own research. Garius Lupus and I have the same birthday, but he's 10 years younger than I.

Anybody want to see the current transits? I put them up at
http://www.bonitovalley.com/astro/transits_090124-27.html

One is for last Saturday, which I cast to see what was going on when my legs folded, and then I cast one for today. I put them both up because a really tight sky is persisting through the end of the Freddie.

Freddie has ended up doing me some good, I think. While I was laid off, I had three phone interviews last week and have a really good contract position that may come through soon. I'll likely have a second phone interview for that job this week and maybe an in person after I get back from SLC. At this rate, I'll be able to redecorate my living room and still have savings left over.

Yes, that's all excellent news! I've had a few offers of more work too, as I said in the salon, and even earned another decent amount of money this afternoon when an old client asked me for help creating some documents. Another client from 2005 asked me to do some more notecards of a painting I photographed way back then, and someone else in the neighborhood wants me to maintain her facebook account for her! (deep pockets)

And yet I always feel like this is the lowest time of year for me, Freddie or no. It's when the sun is in Aquarius, in my 6th house. Aquarius is just not my friend. Last year this time I had the retina problem. At the very least I tend to be a little sluggish and depressed till the sun breaks the horizon of the 7th house.

Or it could be a case of, you know, pointing the bone...

New chart added to the index page, of the minute when Mercury went direct. I'm putting the series of charts up to give y'all a feeling for how the patterns develop ("apply" in astrological parlance), shift relative positions and then "move away" from each other. It's the ultimate 5,000-piece jigsaw puzzle.

Little Notepad has Leo rising, the Moon right on zero degrees of Sagittarius and Sun loosely conjunct Neptune. My advice: start looking for the pony now.

Did anybody buy one of those Llewellyn astrological diaries? Have you been watching the planets?

No, but for some odd reason I googled myself today and one of the highest hits was the chart you did for me!