Horoscopes, Mr Right and Animal Spirituality

“A relationship may be the center of your world today as you pull back from other social obligations. Even though your intention is to stay centered, your ruling planet Mars is moving toward expansive Jupiter through next week, making you a bit restless. Practice self-restraint; wait a few more days before riding the big wave forward.”

From time to time, out of sheer desperation, I stupidly subscribe to daily email horoscopes and the above was waiting for me in my Inbox this morning.

So, a relationship, today, may be the centre of my world. Well, the only relationship I am likely to have today is with the kettle, my cigarettes and this computer. And that suits me fine, to be honest with you!

For months now, horoscopes and clairvoyants have been telling me that Mr Right is waiting for me and I will meet him in the next 12 months. Actually, that isn’t what I want to hear. I would have preferred to know that Joshua’s Gold was going to romp home in the 7.45 at Catterick on Friday with odds-on of 9-2. I would have stuck a tenner on it, then.

My ageing father frequently stares at me with incredulity when he hears of my dating exploits and quest to find Mr Right. His question, blurted in self-righteous Liverpudlian indignation is: ‘Where dz’yer get dese daft sods from, Agnes?”
“From the Internet, Pater,” is my response.
“Well, why don’ ch’yer gerrows more, yer daf’ bugger?” he will ask.
“Because there is nowhere around here to go apart from The Chimes and that is full of Hell’s Angels from Northwich and oddballs in slippers, who smell and want to hug me…”
“Well, how yer gonna meess someone, dzen?”
“From the Internet, Pater,”…And so, Groundhog Day commences…

I need to stay centred today. Well, I only ever list to one side when I have partaken of lots of alcohol, and as I am not drinking at the moment, I am very upright. Sometimes, when the TV is really crap, my eyes will get a bit crossed and everything looks skew-whiff, but apart from that, I am a very centred (or should that be, self-centred?) person.

I don’t like the idea of Mars moving towards expansive Jupiter making me ‘restless’. That sounds like one of the cats is going to contract fleas, which will then bite my ankles remorselessly making me behave as though I have St. Vitus’ Dance. I have thus taken the liberty of de-fleaing them, which they hate, but they have run off now, so I can at least leave my bloater fish paste sarnies on the arm of the settee without them nicking a bite.

Practise self-restraint. No, I won’t! I have one joy in my life, and that is to smoke. I am always on a miserable, bloody, boring diet because I only have to look at a slice of toast and I am the Michelin Man; I don’t drink; and the last time I got jiggy with someone, the UK was pre-decimalisation (or so it feels). So, I am going to smoke away like Puffing Billy today.

I have decided to unsubscribe from the Horrorscopes as words such as ‘quincunx’ (which always sounds vaguely rude), cusp and tripartite (or is that to do with politics?) make me feel as though they are trying too hard to make the astrologers sound as if they are scientific and know what they are doing.

From now on, I shall use more traditional methods of predicting the future, such as, if Norman, the kitten, squeaks when I squeeze his head, it will rain. He has not been wrong yet. And if the rabbits are getting jiggy, it might rain heavily. They haven’t been wrong either. Animals really are in tune with the spiritual world, you know…

Aww...Thump!...I have just got another horoscope message warning me of 'emotional disclosure'...if our only reader scans this, can you ignore everything I have disclosed emotionally, please?