You refuse to buy into society’s petty, narrow-minded definitions of good and evil, or at least that’s what you tell people when they notice you’re a lousy tipper.
Taurus | April 20 to May 20
You’ll be doing a lot of traveling in the near future due to your inability to dribble a basketball effectively.
Gemini | May 21 to June 20
When all’s said and done, you’ve loved and been loved in return, and no one can take that away from you. However, they can make sure you don’t get paid for it.
Cancer | June 21 to July 22
There will come times in life when you find it impossible to tell the dancer from the dance. Be advised the person is the dancer and the dance is the series of motions being made.
Leo | July 23 to Aug. 22
Your true goal continues to elude you when you succeed in breeding pandas to a mailbox, a surprised cat, and a traumatized lab assistant.
Virgo | Aug. 23 to Sept. 22
While “To thine own self be true” is wise advice, it was intended for someone whose own self didn’t sit on the couch eating beef jerky and watching car-auction shows.
Libra | Sept. 23 to Oct. 22
You’ll experience a slight setback when events beyond your control force you to repeat age 8 all over again, which actually isn’t half bad.
Scorpio | Oct. 23 to Nov. 21
You’ve always detested clichés, tired old jokes, and easy irony, which are three more reasons why you’re going to hate being killed by a falling safe.
Sagittarius | Nov. 22 to Dec. 21
They say a good friend will bail you out of jail but a best friend will share your cell. With that in mind, your best friend will stab you with a sharpened toothbrush this week.
Capricorn | Dec. 22 to Jan. 19
Authorities acknowledge that yes, technically you went on a tri-state killing spree, but since you did it in the Four Corners region of the Southwest, it actually makes you look lazy.
Aquarius | Jan. 20 to Feb. 18
When the stars told you this was a good time to start new projects at work, they certainly didn’t expect you to put Vaseline on the stairs and then pull the fire alarm
Pisces | Feb. 19 to March 20
Thanks to the events of this week, when people think “fish sticks,” they’ll think of you. Then they’ll throw up, especially if they’re eating fish sticks.
From Whole Foods CEO John Mackey and his coauthors, a follow-up to groundbreaking bestseller Conscious Capitalism—revealing what it takes to lead a purpose-driven, sustainable business.
John Mackey started a movement when he founded Whole Foods, bringing natural, organic food to the masses and not only changing the market, but breaking the mold. Now, for the first time, Conscious Leadership closely explores the vision, virtues, and mindset that have informed Mackey’s own leadership journey, providing a roadmap for innovative, value-based leadership–in business and in society.
Conscious Leadership demystifies strategies that have helped Mackey shepherd Whole Foods through four decades of incredible growth and innovation, including its recent sale to Amazon. Each chapter will challenge you to rethink conventional business wisdom through anecdotes, case studies, profiles of conscious leaders, and innovative techniques for self-development, culminating in an empowering call to action for entrepreneurs and trailblazers–to step up as leaders who see beyond the bottom line.
September 14, 2020 By VICTOR TANGERMANN (Futurism.com)
Robot Underlords
Two major convenience store franchises in Japan are testing out robots capable of stocking shelves using two creepy hands with three “fingers” each, CNN reports.
The seven-foot is called Model-T, named after the Ford automobile that triggered a car revolution in the early 1900s, and was developed by Japanese startup Telexistence. During a pilot program, it was controlled by a “pilot” in an office miles away.
“It is able to grasp, or pick and place, objects of several different shapes and sizes into different locations,” Matt Komatsu, head of business development and operations at Telexistence, told CNN.
Gripping Food
That makes it more nimble and mobile than the robots used by Walmart to scan shelves for inventory, according to its inventors.
The goal is to allow a single human to work at multiple stores, a solution for possible labor shortages. Japan also has a rapidly aging population with fewer able-bodied people ready to take on such jobs.
Logging In
The Model T is controlled by a human wearing a virtual reality headset and special gloves. A microphone and headphones even allow for communication with nearby shoppers.
The ongoing coronavirus pandemic ended up accelerating development of the Model T as such a technology could end up reducing human-to-human contact. According to CNN, Telexistence saw an uptick in interest over the last couple of months.
1of2Dipsea co-founder Gina Gutierrez says subscriptions to the erotic audio service that caters to women have doubled since shelter-in-place started in March.Photo: Dipsea2of2Dipsea co-founders Gina Gutierrez (left) and Faye Keegan.The company is part of a growing industry of erotic audio.Photo: Dipsea
An inevitable trope of the teenage dramedy is being caught masturbating by your parents. There’s the quick slamming of the laptop, the fuss, the general embarrassment.
With many people adopting new work-from-home routines and houses packed with remote-learning kids or bored roommates, COVID-19 has potentially turned all of us into that hapless adolescent cliche. Privacy is hard to come by during a pandemic, and solitude — unless you live alone — is a luxury. It’s no coincidence that subscriptions for Dipsea, the San Francisco erotic audio content service, have doubled since shelter-in-place started in March.
Focused on prerecorded, realistically acted stories meant to stoke listeners’ imaginations, audio erotica is like porn’s tasteful, Millennial cousin. Since launching in 2018, Dipsea has been a key player in the growing niche, paving the way for websites like Quinn, where user-generated audio porn is grouped into playlists like Quarantine Edition and Boyfriend Energy, and erotic podcasts like Demi Moore’s new scripted project “Dirty Diana,” in which the “Indecent Proposal” star voice-acts as a woman who runs a secret website documenting female fantasies.
“Audio is the fantasy medium,” says Gina Gutierrez, who co-founded Dipsea with Faye Keegan. “In our minds we aren’t confined by our studio apartments or our current sexual partners.”
With an array of erotic short stories under catergories like Vacation, BDSM and Her + You, Dipsea whispers arousing tales into your ear. The content varies from romantic and borderline cheesy to explicit and experimental, but never too crude. The platform, available as an app, releases 12 to 15 pieces of content a month, with new stories every Sunday written by a team of content creators and recorded by voice actors.
We caught up with Gutierrez to find out how the pandemic has changed the way people view intimacy and what listeners are tuning into while steamy strangers are mostly off-limits.
Q: How do you explain the growth since the pandemic started?
A: I think a lot of people realized how much we take intimacy and pleasure for granted as it relates to our mental well-being. Being homebound as a single person, or with a partner who started feeling more like a roommate than a lover, are equally challenging situations. We love providing our listeners a way to check in with themselves, soothe stress and remember how worthy they are of joy. Every so often someone will leave us a review that says, “How have I gone without this for so long?” or “I didn’t know I needed this until now.” That’s the kind of new normal we’re actually excited about.
Q: Who is your audience?
A: The majority of our listeners identify as women ages 25-35, but 18-24 is our fastest-growing age demographic. Listeners are both single (41%) and in a relationship (54%), and 33% identify as queer while 67% identify as straight. Dipsea was designed with women in mind but welcomes listeners of all gender identities. Research shows that women are very likely to use their imaginations to get aroused and often report experiencing a block when trying to access their feelings of arousal and desire. It propelled our desire to create better erotic content for women.
Q: Have you considered COVID-19-theme content?
A: We talked a little bit about whether or not to create content that spoke to the era we’re all experiencing, but ultimately we decided that catching the eye of that cutie across a sweaty, crowded room is exactly the vibe we’re all missing in 2020.
Q: What have listeners been gravitating toward during the pandemic?
A: People are loving our “Get Intimate With” series, where we let listeners have intense and intimate self-insert experiences with their favorite characters, like Freddie from the “Secret Rooms” series and Mark from the “Hot Vinyasa” series, who are fan favorites. We wanted to give listeners a chance to “get into bed” with those characters. The series are intimate, sexy and make you feel like you’re inside the story.
Q: Is there any San Francisco or Bay Area-specific content on Dipsea?
A: The series “Les Rebound” is an awesome ode to being queer in San Francisco.
Q: Why is erotic audio well suited to shelter-in-place?
A: Audio is the fantasy medium. It inspires us to grow our erotic imaginations and offers us endless possibilities. In our minds we aren’t confined by our studio apartments or our current sexual partners. We can imagine bodies in all shapes and sizes, and every character can become our type. It’s incredibly liberating when we recognize our own power to mentally design the scenes that turn us on.
Q: How do you go about consent and “forbidden” words or phrases?
A: We strive to create content that is fundamentally consensual, sex-positive and feminist. Those constraints encourage creativity. We touch a huge range of plotlines and fantasies and reimagine them in ways that feel on-brand for our platform. We work hard to create moments of consent that don’t kill the vibe, to make safe sex between strangers the default, to showcase women as empowered in their relationships, and to represent sexual and ethnic diversity in ways that don’t tokenize those experiences. The one word you’ll never hear is “shame/shaming.”
Q: Looking forward, how will the pandemic shape the way we view sex and intimacy?
A: In this strange new normal of social distancing and isolation, we’re all being reminded how important connection and intimacy are to making us feel human and alive. Pleasure is an opportunity to check in with yourself and your body, a way to self-soothe and a reminder that you’re worthy of joy. Awareness that pleasure is important to wellness is growing faster than ever, and I don’t think that will disappear once the world returns to normal. A silver lining of this universally challenging moment is that it’s helped us to understand how to better and more holistically care for ourselves.
The New Moon in Virgo opens the curtain on a quietly entertaining, versatile drama. The over-emotionality of the Pisces Full Moon has given way to a cool-headed, if rather fidgety, and nervy Virgoan need for both variety and order. We may be more grateful for bookshelves filled with a mix of useful nonfiction, fascinating and amusing novels, and inspiring poetry. We’re inclined to appreciate the order and variety of pharmacy shelves holding a plethora of remedies with promises of improved health. Within the healing realms, we may reach for more of the adaptogenic medicines that have the ability to adjust to our state and needs.
Despite all this — and despite an attention to detail and intricate knowledge — Virgo is, nonetheless, a sign marked by self-doubt. Will the story satisfy the reader? Will all the learned systems really support the great work to be done? Will the medicine cure the problem? Will people be pleased with the results?
Anxious, nervous energy may abound during this lunation. At an individual level, the Moon trining Saturn means that firm resolve and structure help us find the confidence to try to launch plans and attempt new things. Goals benefit from being broken down into small segments, so we merely need to take the next step to make progress. We truly can trust life and ourselves, even if we can tend to be cynical! Mercury reminds us that we all possess skills.
This lunation finds Mercury in Libra, suggesting a fine, alchemical balance. We benefit from a little pinch of this and that; by trusting our senses to find the right tastes, flavors, fragrance notes, blends, and shades. Careful balance applies in the physical world, but also in both personal and professional relationships. Does our situation fling us out of control, causing us to scream “stop!” and hold on tighter, or do we swing in harmony? We can identify where to go further, or when to realize we are overdoing things, or haven’t thought a plan through well enough yet. This attention to balance matters under the New Moon insofar as we are trying to lay the groundwork for new plans. If we hesitate, we may miss the chance to do something definite and positive. But if we get carried away, we may put someone off. So we must access some courage and feel our way, to judge the best direction forward. If we do slip up, we can possibly still retrieve the situation because Libra usually allows for constant rebalancing.
An opposition to Neptune makes this New Moon oddly a bit more like a Full Moon. However, this period is about beginnings, not endings. Neptune is retrograde, so we may need to accept limitations around a dream, rein in a bigger plan, and focus on one or two smaller projects or steps. Yet Saturn’s structure helps us, ensuring we avoid Neptunian traps like being too scattered and ethereal (oscillating through many impressions but initiating nothing definite). The flitting, butterfly aspect of the mind alights long enough to grasp sufficient, sustaining nectar to feed a more definitive course of action. The New Moon, in tight trine to Saturn–Pluto, means there is every chance of concrete answers arising, providing us with the clarity to take definitive action that feels important.
This article is from the Mountain Astrologer, written by Diana Collis.
Researchers have discovered significant sources of phosphine in the atmosphere of Venus — a colorless and odorless gas that they say is a possible sign of life, as it’s often the result of organic matter breaking down here on Earth.
The research was led by Jane Greaves from Cardiff University in the UK, and was published in Nature Astronomy today.
So far, Venus hasn’t topped the list of planets seen by astrobiologists as most likely to harbor life. Its surface is a swirling mix of toxic and extremely hot vapors, and temperatures can reach a toasty 800 degrees Fahrenheit (426 Celsius), while high concentrations of sulfuric acid raining from the skies — with thick clouds blocking most sunlight from ever reaching the surface — would ensure that life as we know it would stand little chance of surviving there.
But despite the inhospitable environment on the surface, some microbial life may be able to survive in the planet’s atmosphere, the researchers hypothesize.
The researchers argue that conventional abiotic mechanisms producing phosphine gas couldn’t entirely account for the unusually high presence of phosphine gas they detected in the atmosphere of Venus. In other words, some of the phosphine gas could have been the result of organic processes.
The team brought forward some ideas as to how phosphine could have been crated through abiotic processes, including sunlight, minerals blown up from the surface, volcanoes, and even lighting. None of the options could’ve made enough of the stuff, however. According to their calculations, natural sources would only account for a maximum of one ten thousandth of the amount detected.
On top of that, to create the observed amount of phosphine, organisms on Earth would only need to work at about ten percent of their maximum productivity, as Paul Rimmer of Cambridge University concluded, according to the statement.
To make their discovery of the gas, the team used the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope (JCMT) in Hawaii.
“This was an experiment made out of pure curiosity, really — taking advantage of JCMT’s powerful technology, and thinking about future instruments,” Greaves said in a statement. “I thought we’d just be able to rule out extreme scenarios, like the clouds being stuffed full of organisms. When we got the first hints of phosphine in Venus’ spectrum, it was a shock!”
The team later confirmed the detection of phosphine using the more sensitive ALMA observatory in the Atacama desert in Chile.
“In the end, we found that both observatories had seen the same thing – faint absorption at the right wavelength to be phosphine gas, where the molecules are backlit by the warmer clouds below,” Greaves added.
“The discovery raises many questions, such as how any organisms could survive,” Clara Sousa Silva, team member at MIT, said in the statement. “On Earth, some microbes can cope with up to about 5% of acid in their environment — but the clouds of Venus are almost entirely made of acid.”
To answer that question, other astronomers came up with their own hypothesis. A recent paper, research led by leading astronomer Sara Seager at MIT, suggested that life could survive in tiny droplets falling towards the ground via gravity. Once those droplets reach the lower levels of Venus’s atmosphere, they’d dry up.
Previous research has shown that the clouds of Venus may actually harbor far more favorable conditions than the surface, with temperatures in the range of 0 to 60 degrees Centigrade and pressures — well within the range of Earth.
“We propose for the first time that the only way life can survive indefinitely is with a life cycle that involves microbial life drying out as liquid droplets evaporate during settling, with the small desiccated ‘spores’ halting at, and partially populating, the Venus atmosphere stagnant lower haze layer,” Seager’s team wrote in the paper.
They suggest that such a lower haze layer, 33 to 48 kilometers in altitude, could be a “‘depot’ for desiccated microbial life.” These desiccated forms would then return to the cloud layer by upward diffusion and ‘rehydrate for a continued life cycle.”
But would be be able to detect these lifeforms? Researchers argued in a 2018 paper “that particles in Venus’ lower clouds contain sufficient mass balance to harbor microorganisms, water, and solutes, and potentially sufficient biomass to be detected by optical methods.”
Thanks to data collected by the European Space Agency’s Venus Express probe, which circled the planet for over eight Earth years, researchers found that most UV was absorbed by sulfur dioxide and iron chloride in the planet’s cloud layer.
Still, scientists may have missed something. Alongside the presence of sulfur compounds, carbon dioxide, and water in these cloud layers, the researchers argue that “coupled iron- and sulfur-centered metabolism in the clouds” could also allow microorganisms to survive there.
On September 17th, 2020 we have a New Moon in Virgo.
As you probably know, New Moons are times of new beginnings. Virgo is the sign of the harvest. This is an especially ‘manifesting’ New Moon, thanks to positive aspects to the other Earth signs.
New Moon in Virgo Trine Jupiter, Saturn And Pluto
The New Moon in Virgo is one of the best New Moons of the year because it trines Jupiter, Saturn and Pluto in Capricorn.
In the last few months, we’ve been totally hammered by the outer planets in Capricorn. And the square from Mars in Aries didn’t ‘help’ either.
However, a trine is a harmonious aspect. Its role is to find the path of least resistance and integrate different energies, so that something constructive can come out of the exchange.
The New Moon in Virgo is a time to find new solutions to old problems.
It is normal to feel overwhelmed and to take a back seat when we have such intense transits, as we had for most of 2020.
However, the New Moon in Virgo is here to say “Ok, what can I do? What can I make from all of this mess?” “Yes, life is tough, but what can I – practically – do to make things better?
Virgo is obsessed with analyzing everything and finding solutions to problems. Virgo is a mutable sign that thrives in chaos. But Virgo is also an Earth sign, so she’s super practical. When everyone else is in the heights of despair, Virgo comes to diligently clean up the mess.
With the New Moon in Virgo, we have 6 out of 10 planets in Earth signs. Earth signs are grounded, practical, and realistic. This is fantastic news if you want to find solutions to problems, and get things done.
Virgo – Self-Sufficiency And Common Sense
The literal meaning of Virgo is “virgin”, but back in Roman times, Virgo or “virgin”, was a word used to describe a person who is self-sufficient – someone who doesn’t need anyone or anything to be complete.
The New Moon in Virgo will remind us that we don’t always need someone else to make us whole and that we can find the resources we need within ourselves.
Virgo is ruled by Mercury, the planet of the mind. Mercury rules both Gemini and Virgo. If in Gemini, an Air sign, Mercury expresses itself verbally, in Virgo, an Earth sign, Mercury works through our body.
That’s why Virgo rules our gut, which is our 2nd brain. This is where we derive our ‘gut feelings’. You may think “gut feelings” is some woo-woo, spiritual type of intuition – but in fact, it is our Virgo body, that just ‘knows’ what makes sense.
If there is one word that could describe Virgo, it would be ‘common sense’. Virgo has the incredible gift of ‘just knowing’ what makes sense, and what doesn’t.
Common sense is the ability to quickly make sense of the world, to make good judgments, to and behave in a practical and sensible way – and this is Virgo’s specialty. We can all agree that common sense is exactly what we need right now.
But that’s not the whole story, because…
New Moon Opposite Neptune – Chaos vs Order. Order vs Chaos
The New Moon makes an opposition to Neptune in Pisces.
Neptune transits can have a bad reputation, but that’s when we don’t understand how Neptune works, and try to outsmart it. And we don’t want to do that with Neptune (or Pluto) – right?
The New Moon is the Sun and the Moon coming together. The Sun and the Moon are the Yin (Moon) and the Yang (Sun) which together represent our identity.
A New Moon opposite Neptune is a time to question your identity – the old definition of who you are – and instead, to embrace the timeless, infinite Self you really are.
Both Virgo and Pisces long for perfection.
Virgo longs for perfection in the material world. Pisces longs for perfection that goes beyond the material. That’s why for Pisces people in general being ‘successful’ by society’s standards doesn’t really mean much.
Virgo believes that perfection can be reached through the principle of order. “If I just get myself sorted, if I just get my act together, everything will be fine”.
Pisces believes that perfection can be reached through surrender. “If I watch a movie/go to a concert/have a glass of wine, I will perhaps connect to that perfect place, where I’m at one with something greater than myself”.
Another way of putting it: Virgo believes perfection can be reached through ‘order’. Pisces believes perfection can be reached through ‘chaos’.
People with strong Virgo or strong Pisces placements, will usually oscillate between order and chaos, since signs that share the same axis basically want the same thing, is just that their approach is different.
The New Moon in Virgo is a great example of this dynamic. The Sun and the Moon are in Virgo. Neptune is in Pisces. Order vs. chaos. Chaos vs. order.
Too much order leads to chaos. And it is in chaos that a new order emerges.
What does that mean for you? The New Moon in Virgo is your opportunity to reinvent yourself.
New Moon In Virgo – Transcendence
Neptune opposite the New Moon will challenge your old identity – and even dissolve your Ego – so that a new, higher Self can emerge.
Neptune in Pisces represents the higher laws of the universe we don’t fully understand with our limited human thinking.
But even if we don’t understand these cosmic laws, it doesn’t mean there’s no order in the cosmos. It doesn’t mean that things don’t make sense (just because we can’t make sense of them).
The Sabian symbol for the New Moon in Virgo “A boy with a censer serves the priest near the altar” beautifully speaks about the Virgo/Pisces reconciliation.
“The boy who serves” is our Virgo identity. “The priest near the altar” is our Neptune opportunities for transcendence. When we perform our menial activities in the “presence of God” or of a higher power, whatever we do, however insignificant, acquires a sacred meaning.
But to get there (Neptune transcendence) we must learn to serve with Virgoan humbleness what is otherwise beyond our spiritual understanding.
We will all get a glimpse of the energy of the New Moon in Virgo, and If you have natal planets or angles around 25° in Mutable signs – Gemini, Virgo, Sagittarius, Pisces – you will feel the energy of the New Moon even stronger.
(CNN)Well, 2020 keeps getting better all the time.Amid a pandemic, civil unrest and a divisive US election season, we now have an asteroid zooming toward us.On the day before the presidential vote, no less.Yep. The celestial object known as 2018VP1 is projected to come close to Earth on November 2, according to the Center for Near Earth Objects Studies at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. It was first identified at Palomar Observatory in California in 2018.Content by RVshareConquer cabin fever safely with RVshare this summerFrom simple camping trips to coast-to-coast explorations, the rentable fleet of 100,000 RVs means you can have outdoor adventures without risking you and your loved ones’ health.”Asteroid 2018VP1 is very small, approximately 6.5 feet, and poses no threat to Earth. If it were to enter our planet’s atmosphere, it would disintegrate due to its extremely small size,” NASA said in a statement. “NASA has been directed by Congress to discover 90% of the near-Earth asteroids larger than 140 meters (459 feet) in size and reports on asteroids of any size.”NASA says that, “based on 21 observations spanning 12.968 days,” the agency has determined the asteroid probably — phew! — won’t have a deep impact, let alone bring Armageddon.The chance of it hitting us is just 0.41%, data show.CNN has reached out NASA for any additional or updated information but has not heard back.
In this cornerstone of modern liberal social theory, Peter Kropotkin states that the most effective human and animal communities are essentially cooperative, rather than competitive. Kropotkin based this classic on his observations of natural phenomena and history, forming a work of stunning and well-reasoned scholarship. Essential to the understanding of human evolution as well as social organization, it offers a powerful counterpoint to the tenets of Social Darwinism. It also cites persuasive evidence of human nature’s innate compatibility with anarchist society.
“Kropotkin’s basic argument is correct,” noted evolutionary biologist Stephen Jay Gould. “Struggle does occur in many modes, and some lead to cooperation among members of a species as the best pathway to advantage for individuals.” Anthropologist Ashley Montagu declared that “Mutual Aid will never be any more out of date than will the Declaration of Independence. New facts may increasingly become available, but we can already see that they will serve largely to support Kropotkin’s conclusion that ‘in the ethical progress of man, mutual support—not mutual struggle—has had the leading part.'” Physician and author Alex Comfort asserted that “Kropotkin profoundly influenced human biology by his theory of Mutual Aid. . . . He was one of the first systematic students of animal communities, and may be regarded as the founder of modern social ecology.”
(Goodreads.com)
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