Category Archives: 2012 Diary

This is a short passage from the part of the Aquarius horoscope that explains the long background leading up to the current changes in your life. –efc

Uranus passed through between 1996 and 2004, which may seem like it’s in the distant past (particularly in our era of Dog Years) however Uranus left its mark on you: the restless, spontaneous quality of this planet imprinted you with the sensation that nothing was worth holding onto because it simply was not possible to cling. Your own influence in the world was something that had mixed results, though you had radical, interesting ideas and were coming into the beginnings of a vision.

Yet that vision came in flashes that were difficult to grasp, much less develop. And for you who prefers to know your way, who prefers to live in a world of orderly progression and some coordinated logic. In sum this transit not only made it difficult to know where you stand – it challenged your trust that you could actually know where you stand.

In a way this was good preparation for the world that arose in the late 1990s and early 2000s – one that was characterized by an explosion of change (if not progress) where everything and anything that was previously believed to have been stable or dependable went through some huge series of upheavals. The Internet propagated on the planet like an instantaneous manifestation of some strange, new energy covering and permeating society. In some way you knew you were part of this and you may have even participated directly, though that still did not add up to a sense of logic or order.

That is the name of the Capricorn essay for Reality Check. I began with an unusual series of events that happen in Capricorn which I have not mentioned elsewhere, or maybe just once. I don’t recall where. In 2012, every time the Moon makes a conjunction to Pluto, it’s an occultation — it blocks Pluto entirely. This happens 19 times between April 2012 and August 2013, every time the Moon goes past Pluto. This has not happened since Pluto was in Cancer (near its discovery degree) in the 1930s. There are 29 eclipse-like events in 2012, as compared to just nine in 2011. Anyway it’s a fun piece and I am looking forward to seeing it on the page.

I am about to begin writing Capricorn’s interpretation. As mentioned, the audio has been finished for a while, and it’s prepared and ready — as soon as the written interpretations are done and edited. Going at the rate of one written interpretation per day — that’s about all I can handle — with any luck at all, I will finish the signs on Saturday with Pisces.

My kitchen table desk, where I have written and recorded nearly all of Revolution. Revelation. Reality Check. Those are the Voyager tarot cards to the right, and to the top left is Raphael's Ephemeris, the one used (and published) by the Brits. Photo by Eric.

Then I’ve reserved two days to rewrite and edit. As far as I am concerned, once this astrology enters someone’s mind, there is no taking it back — so I try to get it right. Another astrologer is also going to read through the signs, to provide a layer of technical editing, to make sure the basic references are correct.

The audio presentations are in three sections; I also recorded a series of 12 practice runs using a special technique involving the minor planets, that I then put on my iPod and took notes from; these notes are feeding the written interpretations. I am reversing the order of my work — forward, backward (through the three audio readings) and then forward again (for the written readings) as there is a distinct energy shift depending on which way the astrologer treads the wheel.

Looking into my notebook, the Capricorn reading will include a discussion of how to handle Pluto going through this sign. There is something about listening to children as a source of wisdom. And there is a question, “Who tells the story of your life?” I may be telling the story of your astrology, but you definitely tell the story of your life.

Note, I will do a separate Capricorn birthday report, but that will be after I move this whole flea circus along.

Don’t miss Eric’s free audio presentation on the secrets of the Mayan Calendar. This image is of a Mayan stucco frieze from Placeres, Campeche. It’s displayed in the National Museum of Anthropology in Mexico City. Photo by Wolfgang Sauber / Wikimedia Commons.

By Eric Francis with help from Ma Kettle. This originally appeared in Cosmic Confidential.

The Shaving Brush and Mug

Discovering my first shaving brush (at the local food coop) and mug (with some searching around town) was what inspired the idea that some very cool old things can have a new role in a sustainable world. Well, it was actually my second encounter with the shaving brush — when I was about five and my father showed me how to shave, half of the instructions involved the use of the brush and mug; they were still in common use in the Sixties.

Photo by Eric Francis.

Decades and many cans of Edge later, I discovered that the shaving brush and soap were better, less expensive, more fun, cheaper and far more environmentally friendly than canned chemical shaving cream.

These became the criteria for “Everything Old is New Again”: the old item or method had to be better, less expensive and more ecologically friendly than the new one. Yet nearly everything we suggest on this list has one other common theme: it requires a skill. In every case, the older, better method requires you to know something, or take care of something, in a way that the modern method does not. The little cake of shaving soap you put at the bottom of a ceramic cup will last for a year or longer, if you keep it dry between uses. Part of the skill is keeping it dry. The soap comes in a cardboard box; that’s the only packaging. A good brush, if you keep it dry between shaves, will last for years. It’s fun to whip up all that lather, which comes out warm if you use warm water. And for ladies it’s the most fun of all: the brush has the approximate consistency of a tongue, but it never gets tired and it’s available any time. You’ll be sitting on the edge of your tub for hours on end.

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