- What ho, my comely woebegones! How is mediaeval France? And how are the fops that fop therein, including your wretched selves? No, don't bother to answer for I wouldn't bother to listen to your reply! Instead, just bear with me in that long-suffering tear-stained manner that you have as I foretell your tragic futures by means of the poisoned chalice of vile and bitter prognostication, the draught of which in this instance pertains to jittery January.
I would ask you not to gulp and swallow the lot, as is your custom. Rather, imbibe the potion sip by sip to prolong the agony and thus embrace each treacherous step you take upon the path of endless sorrow that is known (somewhat risibly, I fancy) as life on earth.
You were stunned little fish-faces last time as you realized the destiny of Joan of Arc was in your foppish hands, for you are a time traveller, cast back to mediaeval France by a vision of the Virgin at Lourdes so that you could learn great spiritual lessons. There you had become a dolphin, seafood being popular with the French upper classes or 'fops' as they were known. You were about to become king too, a rather good thing, even if you did not get the coloured ball you dreamed of, but only if you can overcome the wicked liturgies of the cardinal type fop. I suppose that brings us up to date. If you have any desire to read on, kindly do so. I'm uncertain if I have any desire to breathe after writing it. But then it is a benighted universe ruled by insane gods and I do have a little brown bottle to hold me up.
Mercury the messenger conjoins with vamping Venus and dark Pluto, lord of the underworld. Thus do scheming fops scheme fiendishly as you stand about the place trying desperately to think of something useful to do, a well-practiced stratagem. The cardinal looks at you with piercing liturgical eyes that seem to have daggers in them and you wish you were on a beach somewhere, playing with that coloured ball they never gave you. Ah well! How sad! Never mind!
But what's this? Great elephants and dancing monkeys, it's ghastly planets entering the gloomy sign of the Goat and your solar eleventh house, a place with something of a reputation for good fortune in astrology. Perhaps this will be your salvation, little ninnies! And so it is. The New Moon comes in that dreary sign and an elderly female whose name you can't quite catch comes to your side and says that she will befriend you if you will befriend the maid (that's Joan). She has an extensive retinue (eek), all of whom take an interest in the dolphin of France (that's you). She claims to be a sorcerer. She will ensorcel the cardinal so he will believe himself to be a salmon or a guppy or a small whale and go to play in the sea with coloured balls whilst forgetting all about his fierce enmity for the Maid of Orleans.
You think this sounds as reasonable as anything else you've heard in recent weeks so, as insufferable planets fart in the cosmic winds, you set the dolphin decree upon a very private part of her body, just to seal the bargain. From there, you spend your time dressing in strange clothes in order to have sex with the servants in the time-honoured manner chosen by fops of this era. However, you soon discover most of the servants are actually other fops disguised for the very same purpose.
Typically, you become confused and, with the great Sol Invicti and Mercury the messenger moving into idiot Aquarius and your solar twelfth house, you retire to the seclusion of your chambers. There, you talk to yourself, musing as to why you're actually here and wondering if you can invent the clock in order to tell what time it is so you'll know when to eat and when to go to bed. But by my little brown bottle, as you puzzle and wonder, dark sorceries are set explode across the kingdom of France as the plot to ensorcel the cardinal goes up the liturgical spout, good and proper. Click here next month and read about it, my little fish-faced ninnies!
|
|
