First they demote Pluto, now this:
Yesterday — and for my entire life — I was a Leo. Today I’m a Cancer. And I am anti-happy about it.
Some researchers at the Minnesota Planetarium Society took it onto themselves to double check the calculations that determine the signs of the Zodiac. Babylonian astronomers drafted the original Zodiac during the early first millenniua B.C. by determining the position of constellations along various spots of the ecliptic, the path of the sun, and dividing it into 12 sections — actually 13, see below. Your star sign is based on the position of the sun along the Zodiac on the day you were born.
Well, guess what, the Earth moved and wrecked everything! Over the past several thousands of years, the pull of the moon’s gravity has shifted the Earth by about a month, says Parke Kunkle, a board member at the society.
Like the cast list of the high school play your mom made you try out for, here’s your new part:
Capricorn: Jan. 20-Feb. 16.
Aquarius: Feb. 16-March 11.
Pisces: March 11-April 18.
Aries: April 18-May 13.
Taurus: May 13-June 21.
Gemini: June 21-July 20.
Cancer: July 20-Aug. 10.
Leo: Aug. 10-Sept. 16.
Virgo: Sept. 16-Oct. 30.
Libra: Oct. 30-Nov. 23.
Scorpio: Nov. 23-29.
Ophiuchus:* Nov. 29-Dec. 17.
Sagittarius: Dec. 17-Jan. 20.* Discarded by the Babylonians because they wanted 12 signs per year.
So I’m a Virgo now? I don’t THINK so. I’ve always been a Libra, and the whole Libra personality description even kinda FIT me in some ways (for instance, I remember reading once that we Libras are particularly good-looking… uncanny, huh?) — something from which I took a certain amount of satisfaction, even though I thought the whole thing was hogwash. (Mostly hogwash, anyway. I think the time of year that a person was conceived and gestated and born might conceivably have an impact on that personality — maybe not much, but it seemed remotely conceivable. (The world is different in winter than in summer, and people live and act differently, and bundle babies up more, and the difference could have an impact on a newborn. Conceivably.) Although I didn’t think it was because of stars, and the notion that horoscopes have any value — that a person’s fate will be different on a given day because of when he was born — is laughable.
But now… sheesh.
I expect I’ll get over it, though, as I urged a couple of colleagues to do when they lamented over lunch that they were no longer Virgos. “Hey,” I comforted them. “It’s always been the way of the world that all people start out as Virgos, but usually at some point cease to be.”
But not being Libra… well, that disturbs my sense of balance. And Libras don’t hold with that.
One last comment: We all know that astrology is a crock, right? So… what’s the idea of trying to amend it in light of science, of all things?
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As a former Libra, that doesn’t sound like most of the Libra descriptions I’ve re-drawn and re-fit to suit my personality over the years. Then again that may be the Virgo talking.
As far as the science amending things, astrology was a tack on to give people a reason to remember why they wanted to know why the stars were swimming around up there. So it makes sense that we update, not out of breaking with our past, but keeping up with our very ancient past.
Hmmm. Maybe I’m not a Libra after all. I just read some descriptions of Libra characteristics online, and they sounded kinda… gay. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, it’s just that, applied to me, it’s so danged inaccurate. Right? I mean, am I right?
I’m guessing, though, that those sites read like that because they’re sort of aimed at chicks, rather than at us macho types. You know how chicks are (I am scratching myself and spitting as I type this)…
I bummed about it. All my life, I was a Gemini; now I find out that I’m a Taurus.
Take comfort. The Taurus was one of the most solid, dependable cars Ford ever built.
Of course, the Gemini program DID bring us the space walk…
Yeah, I was a Capricorn, which together with my first-born-ness, German ancestry, yadda yadda explained everything right? (I did annex the Sudetenland in a past life, y’know)….now I’m a Sagittarius–what even *is* that?
You WISH you were a Virgo. This is bs. I’M a Virgo. Always was. Not fixing to be a Leo at this late date.
I too am a disgruntled so-called ex-libra. I don’t feel very virgo. I object.
Ex Libra–isn’t that what they put on pretentious book plates?
But I don’t wanna be an Ophiuchus! I liked the Archer!!
I’m with Scout.
Brad,
The only Fords that I’ve owned were Mustangs.
A ’66 in high school, straight six, four speed manual.
After college, a ’74 Mustang II, four cylinder, 4 speed manual. The Mustang II is a Mustang that Ford shoud never have built.
The Gemini space program… Well, I grew up watching NASA, beginning with Mercury and I still follow the Space Shuttle.
The only comment that I have about NASA’s future direction in space is that it appears that the US is “Lost in Space”.