This Week's Horoscope

Leo (July 23-Aug. 22)

Virgo (Aug. 23-Sept. 22)

It's a messy business, occupying these smelly, sticky, farting bodies. Even if you're immaculately clean and fresh-smelling, you're likely to notice, frequently, that others aren't always so diligent about personal upkeep. Beware of elevators and public transportation if catching the occasional whiff of body odor or a sulfurous emanation from someplace farther south mortally offends you. However, I'd rather you transcend such silly hang-ups (once you've had a kid or a puppy, thus cleaned up plenty of puke and poop, you realize just how ridiculous they are). Virgos are at their best when they're in touch with their earthiest sides. Get dirty this week, but don't just rub your hands in potting soil. Get filthy, sweaty and gross, sans prissiness. Get into it. You know you want to.

Libra (Sept. 23-Oct. 22)

Unlike those languid Leos, you actually use laziness to help motivate you. When the universe hands you an assignment, you usually turn it in early, so you can spend the days before deadline dawdling and gleefully watching everybody else scramble. Unfortunately, your indolence-motivated studiousness has made you soft?on the rare occasion when crunch time catches you unawares, you can't remember how to pull it all together. Because your next few deadlines are of the stealthy variety ("It's due tomorrow?!"), unearth forgotten skills from the days when you still procrastinated; you'll need them.

Scorpio (Oct. 23-Nov. 21)

The mental feat that's required of you now is akin to remembering your locker combination from sophomore year of high school. The data is probably stored in your brain somewhere?after all, you used it several times a day for a whole year?but accessing it may seem too difficult to contemplate. What if you knew a million dollars lay within? You'd be willing to go to much greater lengths to get to it, right? Perhaps you'd hire a hypnotist to help dredge the forgotten memory from your brain, or invent a robot to tirelessly try all 205,379 combinations until the locker opens, or simply buy a blowtorch and blast your way in. Since the rewards awaiting your successful completion of the task at hand are worth more (to you) than $1,000,000, go the extra mile.

Sagittarius (Nov. 22-Dec. 21)

Sing for your supper, songbird. Continuing the latest trend, you're not only being asked to pay for things you used to get for free, you're required to work for them, too. It must be galling, but try not to get too angry or frustrated. Instead, consider it an opportunity to demonstrate your resilience, flexibility and grace under pressure. However, never forget how this feels?not so you can cling to a vengeful, forever-unrequited grudge toward the ignorant assholes who are responsible for your suffering, but so when you're in their shoes you don't inflict a similar fate on anyone else.

Capricorn (Dec. 22-Jan. 19)

When practicing Zen meditation, you sit facing a blank wall and try to let your mind be as quiet as possible. Some Zen teachers recommend closely observing the compelling sensations that threaten to disturb your mind's potential placidity?like cramping feet or unbearable itches in the small of your back?because trying to block them out is more diverting than examining them. Similarly, you shouldn't ignore the myriad distractions that plague you this week. Calling in sick to play videogames all day is a bad idea. But pretending that you don't really really want to won't help you get work done, either. Acknowledge your irresponsible cravings; you'll get to indulge them sooner than you think.

Aquarius (Jan. 20-Feb. 18)

This hasn't been your most productive season in recent memory. If you were a salmon swimming upstream, you'd never make it to the spawning pools. At best you've been treading water?certainly not leaping up waterfalls or forging through whitewater rapids. However, with the full moon in your sign next week, you have a chance to redeem your lack of forward progress in one stroke, like being scooped up in a bucket and airlifted to the river's source, where you can finally attend to the business you've been avoiding all summer.

Pisces (Feb. 19-March 20)

Don't tell me you're out of tricks. There are fish that "fly," and some that can walk on adapted fins to find new water. There are those that can burrow in silt or lurk beneath rocks. Others hide in plain sight, or inflate themselves to inedible proportions or tear their adversaries to shreds with rows of razor-sharp teeth. Pisceans possess the versatility represented by their natural namesakes, which is why you've earned reputations as chameleons of the zodiac. It's true that you may have to dust off some secret techniques you haven't used in a long while to handle the twisty tangles ahead, but don't for a second delude yourself into believing that you can't handle what's coming yourself, and masterfully.

Aries (March 21-April 19)

You're The Human Torch. Blazing with fiery power, you can fly brightly through the sky like a comet, hurl fireballs at your antagonists and throw up walls of flame as defense against the things that threaten you. But you're lonely. What's the use of being able to soar gloriously above town when you have to do it alone, since whoever you try to bring with you gets scorched? They say that power is isolating; that may be true to some extent, but it's not universal. Some types of power are lonelier than others, like the kind you're exercising. Perhaps it's time to pursue different sources of strength? Just don't go to the opposite extreme; I think The Iceman is probably a little lonely too.

Taurus (April 20-May 20)

This week, you're sort of a commando of love, forcing people together at gunpoint. Wielding your AK-47 like some kind of kamikaze cupid, you've been wreaking romantic havoc with fearsome glee. Just be careful; being the love child of Rambo and Aphrodite comes with responsibilities, not just ardor-tipped bullets. Although you're to continue spreading your terrifying goodwill prolifically, the commandments from on high dictate that you do so more wisely than capriciously?don't get carried away with your outlandish matchmaking. Pair people for their own good, not for your entertainment.

Gemini (May 21-June 20)

Do you ever get the feeling that other people are experiencing things more intensely than you are? It's like you're wearing a gossamer-thin Kevlar veil. Somehow you're shaded from the full force of the sun, protected from the stinging blast of a summer storm or shielded from the genius of a work of art. Don't worry, your reality-softening protections are only temporary and ought to be appreciated if at all possible: Even if you haven't exactly noticed them, the world-muffling astrological layers you're sporting right now are the envy of hypersensitive Pisceans everywhere. Soon enough, something will part the shroud and nearly blind you with its brilliance. Enjoy the relative tranquility of your current state while it lasts.

Cancer (June 21-July 22)

Hey, Headless Horseman. That's what they're calling you on the street these days. Don't look at me! I'm not the one who's been cultivating a reputation for being blindly vengeful. Sure, the world's bitten you in the ass more than your share lately, but don't disavow your part in helping to create the situations that stung you. (I'd rather forget how you lashed out at innocent bystanders when you subsequently ran around with your head cut off, swinging your Tongue-Whip of Retribution.) This week, control your wrath: either be certain that its recipients are truly deserving of it, or don't inflict it on anyone at all.

[Caeriel@yahoo.com](mailto:caeriel@yahoo.com)