I thought I’d share some down-home astrology with you today. The Sun is squaring that gassy giant Neptune for a couple of days (November 30-December 1) — and I find myself semi-housebound with an eye infection. Neptune is pretty much on my natal Sun right now, which is also my chart ruler. The [...]

Donald Trump has been on TV since 2004, sitting at a big desk with the stars and stripes behind him. He wasn’t the president then, just pretending to be a boss on the reality TV show The Apprentice. He looked menacing and said, “You’re fired”, and rewarded contestants if they were “good”, and [...]

As some readers of this blog may have noticed, I couldn’t bring myself to take a close look at the close of polls chart for the US election. It was just too important — and I was scared of what I might find. However, a couple of weeks ago, when I was writing your horoscopes for […]

Hot-metal printing was finally killed off in the mid-1980s. Its demise had been a long time coming, as it was superseded by other cleaner, faster, cheaper technologies. London’s print unions were some of the last in the world to hold out, in the Wapping Dispute with Rupert Murdoch’s News [...]

Mars and Pluto are having their biannual conjunction — today, tomorrow, and the day after. Yes, that’s two warriors having a confab in ambitious, driven, earthy Capricorn; the planet of action, Mars, and the planet of the Underworld, Pluto, working together; war plus power. On the mundane [...]

Chiron, the erratic asteroid that weaves between Uranus and Saturn, was discovered on November 1, 1977 on a photographic plate that had been taken on October 18. That second date might just ring a bell for you if you happen to be interested in contemporary art – because it’s also the [...]

Mercury Rx in Virgo 30 Aug- 22 September 29°-14° My goodness — what a super duper Mercury Rx. My household is swept up in a frenzied combined back-to-school, major-clear-out reading party. Here are some good things that have happened in the last few days. • You can see the floor of the garden [...]

  A piece of wood, some catgut, ebony: a violin. Grapes transformed into wine. Paint transformed into image. Practical magic. This month opens with a wondrous eclipse in the sign of skill and craftsmanship, Virgo, which opens up the powerful generational aspect between Saturn and Neptune, [...]

Neptune rules fashion and glamour and it’s been interesting to watch what’s happened since he roared into Pisces in 2011. Men rediscovered their inner dandies; women went kind of dishevelled and started dying their hair crazy colours. Neptune in Pisces 2011 -2025 Hair has gone all the shades [...]

We are in the middle of a season of retrogradacity. Mars until June 30 Mercury until May 22 (in the shadow until June 7) Saturn until August 13 Pluto until September 26 Meanwhile, Jupiter and Venus have both turned direct. This should give you a hint — do good, beautiful, generous things — and [...]

Mercury, messenger of the gods, will be crossing the face of the Sun in a few hours.  You’ll be able to see this from Earth — with the right equipment. This particular event is not rare — but it is unusual. It happens about 14 times per century — and it’s always in Taurus or Scorpio — […]

When we talk about Venus, we talk about allure. When Venus, the planet of beauty and attraction, is in Taurus, she is in her own sign. Fixed Earth: the sign of full-busting spring in the north, when thoughts turn to what the birds and the bees do. Venus is, of course, the planet of love and [...]

“There are only two or three human stories, and they go on repeating themselves as fiercely as if they had never happened before.” Willa Cather I can add “failure to hire leather-trousered pirate as childminder” to my Mother’s List of Shame. My kids are a tad irritated that Captain Hook is not [...]

One of the pleasures of this retrograde period… Saturn Rx in Sagittarius, the sign of higher learning, the exotic and libraries Mars station (Rx on April 17) also in Sagittarius Mercury in shadow (Rx on April 28) in Taurus, ruled by Venus the goddess of beauty and art Jupiter Rx in Virgo, the [...]

This extraordinary gory painting, possibly by Caravaggio, was found in an attic in the French city of Toulouse a couple of years ago, but not presented to the public until yesterday. It’s fascinating that it should be revealed at just this time of retrogrades, a time of retrieval — perhaps [...]

“I want these crimes to be made public”, leaker “John Doe” to the Süddeutsche Zeitung. It turns out that very rich people have been hiding their money in secret bank accounts abroad. Why do they feel the need to do this? Either a) because the money is stolen or b) because they are avoiding [...]

James Taylor’s soft, reedy baritone is so sweet and his melody-weaving so certain, his lyrics so perfectly distilled and his phrasing so effortless — he truly was blessed by the gods of music and song. Indeed, his first album, which included classics like Carolina in My Mind and Rainy Day [...]

Los Angeles will eat you. The LA music biz specialises in packaging young girls into pop stars — Katy Perry, Taylor Swift, Rihanna, Ariana Grande, Nicky Minaj, Miley Cyrus, Britney Spears. The singer-songwriter Kesha is one of those. Spotted by producer Dr Luke at the age of 17,  she was [...]

The composer, Maurice Ravel, was born on March 7, 1875 into a musical family in the town of Ciboure, where the River Nivelle meets the Atlantic Ocean in the Basque country. (We are catching up with some missed dates for In The Key Of Pisces…) He was an innovator and a rebel. Rejected by the [...]

As you probably already know, the 27 Club is a term for all those singers who died too young, at the age of 27. The list is long and it includes, off the top of my head, Amy Winehouse, Jeff Buckley, Jimmy Hendrix, Jim Morrison, Kurt Cobain and Janis Joplin. In fact there is something important [...]