Rob Brezsny

Happy Birthday! VIRGO (August 23-September 22) “Our job is to become more and more of what we are,” says poet Marvin Bell. “The growth of a poet seems to be related to his or her becoming less and less embarrassed about more and more.” Whether or not you’re a poet, Virgo, I would like to […]

Happy Birthday! VIRGO (August 23-September 22) “Everything is unique,” said the 19th-century authors known as the Goncourt brothers, who wrote all their books together. “Nothing happens more than once in a lifetime. The physical pleasure that a certain woman gave you at a certain moment, the exquisite dish that you ate on a certain day—you […]

Happy Birthday! VIRGO (August 23-September 22) Wheel of Fortune is a TV game show in which players vie to guess a mystery phrase that is revealed letter by letter. On one episode not too long ago, a highly intuitive contestant solved the puzzle even though just one letter had been unveiled. The winning answer was […]

Happy Birthday! VIRGO (August 23-September 22) Avant-garde author Gertrude Stein was renowned for her enigmatic wordplay and cryptic intuitions, which brought great pleasure to her long-time companion Alice B. Toklas. “This has been a most wonderful evening,” Alice once remarked after an especially zesty night of socializing. “Gertrude has said things tonight it’ll take her […]

Happy Birthday! VIRGO (August 23-September 22) In August 2009, 120 scientists and their helpers staged a BioBlitz in Yellowstone National Park. Their goal was to find as many new species as they could in one day. To their surprise and delight, they located more than 1,200, including beetles, worms, lichens and fungi that had never […]

Happy Birthday! LEO (July 23-August 22) Science writer K.C. Cole asks this question: “How would you hold 100 tons of water in thin air with no visible means of support?” Here’s her answer: “Build a cloud.” What you have before you right now, Leo, is a comparable scenario. Your assignment is to materialize a phenomenon […]

Happy Birthday! LEO (July 23-August 22) For 34 years, a diligent Californian named Scott Weaver worked on creating a scale model of San Francisco using toothpicks. Meanwhile, Eric Miklos, of New Brunswick, was assembling a 40-foot-long chain of bottle caps. And in 2006, a team of artists constructed a 67-foot-tall gingerbread house, the world’s largest, […]

Happy Birthday! LEO (July 23-August 22) Astronomer Sir Fred Hoyle rejected the prevailing scientific theory that life on this planet emerged by accident from a primordial soup. The chance of that happening was as likely as “a tornado sweeping through a junkyard [and assembling] a Boeing 747 from the materials therein.” I do think that […]

Happy Birthday! LEO (July 23-August 22) During my years as a singer in rock bands, I’ve had a theatrical approach to performing. On some occasions, I arrive on stage from the back of the club. Dressed in leather and rags and witchdoctor finery, with a rainbow of fake eagle feathers splayed from my coiffure, I […]

Happy Birthday! LEO (July23-Aug. 22) As I ponder your immediate future, I’m reminded of a scene from The Simpsons. Here’s the situation: While visiting the home of a colleague, the superintendent of schools is surprised to witness an anomalous outbreak of spectacular light. “Aurora Borealis?” he exclaims. “At this time of year? At this time […]

Happy Birthday! Cancer (June 21-July22) The great-grandson of a slave, Cancerian Thurgood Marshall (1908-1993) was America’s first African-American Supreme Court Justice. According to Thurgood, a play about his life that appeared on HBO, his unruly behaviour as a school kid played a role in launching him toward his vocation. As punishment for his bad behaviour, […]

Happy Birthday! Cancer (June 21-July22) While listening to the sound collage radio program Over the Edge on KPFA, I learned that a new primary colour has been detected. Quite different from red, yellow or blue, it has its own distinct hue that’s impossible to describe. You really have to see it to appreciate its essence. […]