The Reverend Wright is Not 75!!

How dare they**!!!?**
He is 66 years old. And that's a fact.
An energetic 66, I would add.

It's Cherry Blossom Time!

I Wonder how they're blooming in DC.

The Laboring World

The business of living is hard work. No doubt about it. Oddly, the thing has been divided into "the working class", meaning those who work, I guess, and the rest. Those who don't work? The elite? The idle class? The upper class? The management?

The lower class. The laborers. The rural lower middle class. The rural upper lower class. The urban sub-class. Middle class white catholic workers with one kidney. Latino housewives who make 100 grand and up a year from home.
It's all so confusing. Hard to know who you are. Where one preee-sice-lee fits in.
Get me the labeling department!!
Photo: William Gedney

Zelda is Officially Nuts!

(Zelda is Myrtle Rae's chicken, for those of you who are new here.)

She developed a crush on Barack Obama and suddenly started laying like crazy. You already know how high strung and erratic she is with her Mars-Venus-Uranus in the 5th. Colored eggs on a Neptune transit and unpredictable output. Her explosive romantic nature.

Well now every time he does one of those crescendos with his voice then clips it forcefully at the end, she lays an egg. She WILL NOT be going to any of his live rallies! And that's that!

Luncheon In Pennsylvania

Please be my guest.

Taurus Has Arrived

Time to relax and enjoy life.

Bitterness

It used to be pointed out to me, not infrequently, that I had a negative attitude. It's true I've been a staunch critic of society most of my life. And of others, admittedly.

It was mildly disturbing, factual enough, so I worked on it and tried to cultivate a more agreeable personality. The funny thing is .... I didn't want to be thought of as bitter. It did seem like an insult. I knew I was angry a lot but that didn't bother me all that much. Bitter was never applied to me, though. It seemed like it was for older people.

So I got to wondering, "What is this thing called bitter? Why the aversion? "

Bitter: Having an acrid, disagreeable taste. Unpleasant to accept.
Acrid: burning, sharp, pungent
acris: acid

If it's one of the four taste buds, it must be pretty important. Part of the main sensation of life since only four tastes made it to the human tongue. My theory is that the taste receptors are symbolic of experience and we need sweet, salty, sour, and bitter to maintain our places in empirical space and time. Sweet is easy to take in, salty is delicious, sour is a little tricky, but bitter is tough. Then I started thinking of bitter things .... smoke, medicines, fruit seeds, herbs, weeds.

So here's my conclusion. Bitterness is unpleasant but comes in anyway. The receptors indicate the ability to assimilate the experience. It can even cause a sort of sickness but in the end I think it could be part of healing. Part of acceptance of the whole reality of the physical realm and it's emotional counterpart. And the acid could be a catalyst in the human chemistry. A stimulation. There's a certain amount all the time. There's probably more bitterness in my make-up than I realized, now that I'm no longer especially angry. And of course, I am a little bit older.

A Feminist Primer for The 21st Century

I'm an Aries Rising and I've been one of the boys all my life. Rule # one: don't compete playing their game. You play your own. You call it. They are easily impressed, believe me. You need not fear them, even when they are in groups. Most of them are a hair's breadth from strangling on their neck ties anyway. They're just as oppressed as you are.

If you want to play the game well and advance it's also advisable to leave the feminine manipulation for other times, and often it's hard to detect the behavior, it's so habitual. Once you establish that coy male-female dynamic you're stuck with it. Not that feminine behaviors shouldn't be expressed, they just shouldn't be exaggerated, caricaturized, and used extensively for gain. On the other hand, tough imitations of male bravado won't do either. Know how to win, know how to lose.

Let's consider the pool hall, for example, a bastion of XY gamesmanship. I'm the worst pool player known to humanity, so I don't click the balls. I do enjoy the atmosphere, though, and I love the sounds. Love'em.
So I hang out with the boys doing my own thing, having a good time anyway. Main point: be yourself. If you can clear the table, by all means, beat them to it.

"The Women's Rights Movement marks July 13, 1848 as its beginning. On that sweltering summer day in upstate New York, a young housewife and mother, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, was invited to tea with four women friends. When the course of their conversation turned to the situation of women, Stanton poured out her discontent with the limitations placed on her own situation under America's new democracy. Hadn't the American Revolution had been fought just 70 years earlier to win the patriots freedom from tyranny? But women had not gained freedom even though they'd taken equally tremendous risks through those dangerous years. Surely the new republic would benefit from having its women play more active roles throughout society. Stanton's friends agreed with her, passionately.

Within two days of their afternoon tea together, this small group had picked a date for their convention, found a suitable location, and placed a small announcement in the Seneca County Courier. They called "A convention to discuss the social, civil, and religious condition and rights of woman." The gathering would take place at the Wesleyan Chapel in Seneca Falls on July 19 and 20, 1848.

The Women's Rights Convention drafted a Declaration of Sentiments. The Declaration of Sentiments ended on a note of complete realism:

In entering upon the great work before us, we anticipate no small amount of misconception, misrepresentation, and ridicule; but we shall use every instrumentality within our power to effect our object. We shall employ agents, circulate tracts, petition the State and National Legislatures, and endeavor to enlist the pulpit and the press in our behalf.

Stanton was certainly on the mark when she anticipated 'misconception, misrepresentation, and ridicule.' Newspaper editors were so scandalized by the shameless audacity of the Declaration of Sentiments, and particularly of the ninth resolution -- women demanding the vote-- that they attacked the women with all the vitriol they could muster. The women's rights movement was only one day old and the backlash had already begun!"

The women's rights movement of the late 19th century went on to address the wide range of issues spelled out at the Seneca Falls Convention. Eventually, winning the right to vote emerged as the central issue, since the vote would provide the means to achieve the other reforms. All told, the campaign for woman suffrage met such staunch opposition that it took 72 years for the women and their male supporters to be successful.

As you might imagine, any 72-year campaign includes thousands of political strategists, capable organizers, administrators, activists and lobbyists. The story of diligent women's rights activism is a litany of achievements against tremendous odds, of ingenious strategies and outrageous tactics used to outwit opponents and make the most of limited resources. It's a dramatic tale, filled with remarkable women facing down incredible obstacles to win that most basic American civil right - the vote."
History of the Movement: Living the legacy

Although there were many grievances, when women originally fought for equality they had a specific mission; to get the right to vote. It was simple and easy to focus on the prize. Now the goal is more diffuse which could be why organized political movements for women's liberation haven't taken off. In the long run, that might be a benefit, encouraging women to stick up for themselves in more unique and creative ways. What do women stand for? Some say they are nurturing and anti-war. Progressive and caring. But not all of them are and still they deserve equal access to opportunity. So defining the mission has been a problem and maybe each woman has to decide that for herself. Women who reject careers should be just as respected as the judge or the cardiac surgeon. And at this point in evolution if it takes enhanced effort to get into prestigious positions, so be it. Just do it.

Uranus in Aries is a perfect time to establish identity and equality, drawing on genuine strength, not an imitation of toughness. Brilliant strategy can be mastered with the Mars-Uranus combination. The optimum amount of aggression to employ, especially with the square to Pluto in Capricorn, is another lesson of value, for those who want it. It applies to men, too.

Insecurity

As Mars finishes his triumphant march across the USA stellium in Cancer, emotions are steamy and perhaps on the verge of boiling. The word of the day is "clinging".

Of course we cling. We're clingons. Four planets in Cancer?

Another popular expression is "out of touch".

Well, with all this Aquarius going on almost everyone is out of touch. I know I am.

All very accurate and in keeping with the astrological specifications.

Bitter: One of the Four Human Taste Buds

Much of your pain is the bitter potion by which the physician within you heals your sick self.
Kahlil Gibran

In The Desert

In the desert
I saw a creature, naked, bestial,
Who, squatting upon the ground,
Held his heart in his hands,
And ate of it.
I said: "Is it good, friend?"
"It is bitter-bitter," he answered;
"But I like it
Because it is bitter,
And because it is my heart."
Stephen Crane

Good Jeeziss Anne!!

I wish those goddammed Democrats would make up their minds!!! Always a debate with them.
My parrot Mortimer is in gastro-distress again from the piercing sounds of those particularly harping voices ad nauseum, ad infinitum. His ears have gotten more sensitive with age. And I can't concentrate on my stained glasswork. Sometimes democracy is too frippin' slow.

Somebody's gotta make a decision. There's a jack-ass administration to get rid of!!!

Well, all you good sports ... enjoy yourselves.
To hell with 'em!
Words from the irrepressible Myrtle Rae Bernstein