Homage to the Virgo Women

It would appear that Virgo Sisterhood is far stronger than I originally presumed. It would appear that I under estimated them... severely. That statement comes from a September 2 Virgo.

For whatever combination of reasons, I have never really taken a hard look at my astrological home girls. I have had a strong tendency to discount any female I encountered who happened to be a Virgo.

Perhaps it because I actually do happen to have a Virgo sister (born on 9/10/1963)... Perhaps it is because the two of us have an aggression score of 650 Sirus 1.1... Perhaps it is because she really has been my nemesis in scores of years past... I don't know...

We are almost at the end of Virgo season. Tomorrow is officially the last day of Virgo season. Next comes Libra. As these past 30 days have rolled by, I have been more and more astonished by the names that have come up on the IMDB.com birthday list.

I already knew that most of classic dames of Hollywood's golden era were Virgo women. I already knew Lauren Bacall, Ingrid Berman, Greta Garbo, and Sophia Loren were all born around my birthday. I noticed this through the years.

I already knew about my birthday buddy, Salma Hayek. I knew about Shania Twain and Faith Hill, two of my all-time favorite women. I hesitate to mention this, but I already knew about two-time defending AVN performer of the year, Tori Black.

I did not know that any of the following women were Virgos:

• Angie Everhart
• Barbara Eden
• Claudia Schiffer
• Heather Thomas
• Jacqueline Bisset
• Rachel Ward
• Rachel Hunter
• Raquel Welch
• Rose McGowan
• Shannon Elizabeth

I'm not even naming all of the famous women whose photos I just posted.

Folks, is it just me, or does this list contain most of the biggest sex-symbols from the 1930s clear up to the 1980s? You have 50 years of the biggest names on the Virgo list. No wonder the Scorpio dudes rank Virgo women #1.

Before I continue with my opinion, you should know conjunction is a tricky thing in Astrology. It's an incredibly powerful aspect, and often ranked as the single most powerful aspect. Unfortunately, it is unpredictable. You may love them. You may hate them. It depends on how they strike you. If they remind you of everything you hate about yourself, you will certainly dislike the conjuncted ones. If you strongly identify with them, and have an intuitive understanding of the conjuncted one, you're going to love them.

As a Virgo, I usually disdain Virgo women. It's not easy for them to get me to react to them. I would have told you I was biased against them. I would have also told you I had few, if any, good Virgo scores. Upon further review, I find plenary evidence to overturn that call. It would appear that I am wrong on all counts.

It seems that I have been reacting to Virgo women all along. Barbara Eden, in particular, was my first childhood flame. When I was 5 or 6, I thought she was the ultimate woman. I wasn't the only one. All my buddies in school thought she was the ultimate woman also.

Later, during the 1970s, I thought Raquel Welch was the reigning goddess of women. I always thought Lauren Bacall and Ingrid Bergman were insanely gorgeous. I recall seeing Rachel Ward for the first time in 1981 when I saw Sharky's Machine with my dad. She blew my brains out. I didn't know what hit me.

I ran my scores versus all Virgos born between 1966 and 1994, and it would appear that there are far more good scores than err I thought before. Top Virgo was born on August 31, 1985. She just turned 26 years old, and she's got a madness-educing score of 390. There are many marvelous Virgo scores in 1985. 1987 features a top score of 304. 1980 has a score of 303. 1976 holds a top score of 280. I have a 275 versus women born on 9/21/1974.

It would appear that it is indeed theoretically possible for me to hook up with a fellow Virgo. I would have scoffed at that notion just 30 days ago. I am more compatible with my own than I would have originally suspected.

In any case, these past 30 days have forced me to re-evaluate my home-girls. I am not prepared to say that the girls of my clan are hotter than those of the Capricorn or Pisces clans. I am still very, very biased in favor of these two clans.

However, it seems that for every Capricorn like Eva Gardner, I can show you two Virgo women like Lauren Bacall and Ingrid Bergman. For every one Pisces super model like Cindy Crawford, I can show you two like Rachel Hunter and Angie Everhart. I am leaving Claudia Schiffer out of this.

This may be a function of our general numerical superiority. Virgo is one of the most common signs. We are born during the baby boom that happens at the end of every summer. However, you have to give our tribe it's due. We got a lot of good looking women (and men).

I wanna go on the record and say that God only made one perfect Virgo woman. That was Faith Hill. Shania Twain and Lauren Bacall came within micro-fractions of a nanometer of perfection, but they didn't quite make it.

A gallery of Virgo women

2011 NFL Season Week 3 Predictions

Without further ado, here are my week 3 picks. Commentary tomorrow.

2011 NFL Season Week 2 Outcomes

Well folks, it was a banner week for my predictions. I went 14-2 this weekend. I should have put some money on it in Vegas. Of course, I would have preferred to go 13-3. Unfortunately, my Rams didn't put a dent on my record.

I want to know if any of the pros did better than me! I bet they didn't.

The spoiler was that my team did what I expected them to do in New York. We just don't have good skill position players on offense. The defense is more than good enough. Our lack of play makers on offense forms a hard cap on our achievements in 2011.

The Bronocs over the Bengals was a very mild surprise. These are two football teams ass-deep in the quagmire of rebuilding. Both are poor football teams. When one poor football team defeats another, the outcome cannot be described as a shocker. You might not even be able to use the term upset.

On the other hand, shocking upset is the only term you can use to describe the Titans' victory over the Ravens. What do you call it when a rebuilding squad takes out the odds-on favorite for the AFC Championship?

It's pretty straightforward folks: The Ravens shot their wad against the Steelers and they came out flat as hell for the Titans. They were expected a free walk-over victory I guess. It was a gimme. Nope, the Titans took down a listless Raven team that just couldn't get it up.

I still think the Ravens are the prohibitive favorite in the AFC. Hopefully, this is a great lesson for them.

Drive (2011) good acting, razor thin story, I'm not buying it

If you read rottentomaotes.com, you will know Drive (2011) is the current hot-flick. It is making a lot of waves with the critics. It isn't making a lot of money, however, given it's low-budget characteristics, it will probably be seen as a big success.

I saw it last night, and I am not buying in. I'm not drinking the Cool Aid. I give it the thumbs down.

Why? I just had a conversation with my dad and one of my coworkers on this very subject. Every movie ever made can be divided into two halves: The first half is pure story. The second half is acting.

If you ask me, the story is by far the more important component. The story gets you 75% of your grade. Great acting will only get you 25% of your grade. It is far easier for me to forgive a great story with poor acting than a poor story with great acting. The play is the thing, as Shakespeare says. Just as surely as you can't polish a turd, great acting can't make a poor story good.

Most of the people who dwell on planet Earth are fans of the story first, and acting second. I am in this category. However, there is a strange tribe of performance artist in this world who are fans of acting first, as the story is just an excuse to see some great acting. I will never understand this group. As long as I may live, I will never understand these people.

Unfortunately, Drive is a razor-thin story. It is also a very hackneyed and cliched story. There are some great acting performances, but these performances just can't polish the turd that is this story.

What is this story?

• It's a story about the slimy underbelly of disorganized crime in Los Angeles
• Ryan Gosling reprises Jason Statham's role as the transporter. He is a professional driver for the disorganized crime factions of Los Angeles.
• It's an unrequited and frustrated love story in which Gosling falls in love with the semi-married MILF. He subsequently tries to help her jail-bird husband out of a jam for the sake of the kid.
• There is a standard rote, proforma heist and double cross.
• Then we have the compulsory revenge-out-of-a-jam sequence.
• It is a very low-cost movie, made at home in L.A. A couple of television style car-chases are the big expenditures.
• The script was automatically generated by script-o-magic machines.

Anything else? Not really. You've seen it all 20 times now.

Folks, I am calling the producers out for yet another attempt to market Ryan Gosling to the single mothers of this world. This is already his strongest demographic, and they are trying to profit from it. Soon, this movie will be in heavy rotation on all the girly channels like Oxygen and A&E.

So the acting performances are strong? So what? What does this amount too? What does this purchase us? Does this get us a better story? Nope. It's all for naught. This is a very forgettable movie. In two years time, no man (with an emphasis on the gender man) will remember that this movie was ever made.

With that said, there is some very interesting Astrology happening in this movie. For me, this was really the only interest aspect of the procedure.

As you may or may not know, Ryan Gosling is a Scorpio. Ryan Gosling is a November 12, 1980 Scorpio. He happens to walk around all movie long wearing a white racing jacket with a big gold and orange scorpion on the back. He even recounts the story of the scorpion and the frog to the mafia boss he's gunning for. It's interesting that many have described his performance as extremely intense. If you look up Scorpio characteristics, intensity is #1, jealousy is #2.

Bryan Cranston, Gosling's business partner and budy, just happens to be a March 7, 1956 Pisces. What do we know about Scorpio and Pisces? These two water signs frequently team up. This is a classic match up.

Cranston and Gosling are both under the shield of a mafia boss played by Albert Brooks. He is a July 22, 1947 Cancer, cusping on Leo. What do we know about Cancer? It's the Cardinal leadership sign of the water clan. So we have a Pisces and a Scorpio under the leadership of a Cancer... hummmmm...

And they have great acting chemistry together.

Then we have Carey Milligan, Ryan's MILFy love interest. This is the clean-miss and the blow-it point of the movie. She just happens to be a May 28, 1985 Gemini. This is why I didn't buy the romance and I wasn't feeling her. If she had been born 1 week earlier, everything would have been just fine. I didn't feel any chemistry between these two. I am pretty sure there wasn't any.

If you guys had just cast Jordana Brewster or Jessica Alba as Gossling's love interest, the movie would have been twice as good... but that wouldn't have gotten us that far. Next time, you cast a hot Taurus woman versus Gosling. You will see him spark-up big-time.

Then we have Oscar Issac, who plays Carey's jail-bird husband. He is a January 5, 1980 Capricorn. He has good acting chops, and he worked extremely well with Gosling.

I have been noting lately how often Scorpios and Capricorns team up. It seems to happen all the time. I would have guessed that there would be more power struggles between these two, but they seem to have a strong affinity for each other.

Then we have Ron Perlman, who plays the really, really bad mafia guy. He is an April 13th, 1950 Aries dude. He is Gosling's arch-nemesis in this movie. Perlman is the guy that Gosling just has to kill. What was I just telling you about Aries and Scorpio? Deadly enemies in most cases. These guys just don't like each other. It just might be the worst of the fire-water conflicts.

I find it interesting that the water sign scorpio drowns the fire-sign aries in the ocean. What a terrible way for a fire-sign guy to be extinguished...

Somebody in Hollywood is absolutely playing around with astrology.

Despite some pretty good ensemble acting, this movie still doesn't make the grade. I give it a C-.

I am having a very good day (9-1)

It's a rare thing when I stop to boast in the middle of game day, but I had such a rare morning, I thought I just had to say something.

Check my week 2 picks from earlier in this week.

If the Ravens had not lost in the most shocking upset of the day, I would have been totally undefeated this morning. Right now I am 9-1. I am off to a flying start, and already guaranteed a winning record for the week.

I should have placed some action in Las Vegas. I just found a 1986 Pisces woman who is a party pit manager in Las Vegas through POF.COM (plenty of fish dot com). Maybe I will ask her to put some action on it next week.

Bod Pod X: Moderate Risk

So I had my 10th Bod Pod test this morning. It was pretty good. As per usual, it was not everything I had hoped, but (all things considered) it was a pretty damn good milestone. Just like Super Bowl X once was once regarded, this was the best one ever (thus far).

I apologize for the wet-spots on the paperwork, but I spilled some water on the documents.

In summary, the facts of the case are these:

1. My total weight was 196.731, a little higher than expected, but a reduction of 7.003 pounds
2. My fat-mass went down from 55.912 pounds to 48.964 pounds; a reduction of 6.948 pounds
3. My lean weight decreased from 147.821 to 147.767 pounds. This is scarcely 0.05299 of a pound, or 0.86 of one ounce of loss. This is within the margin of error.
4. My Body Fat Percentage decreased from 27.4% to 24.9%. This is a reduction of 2.5%, and just barely enough to move me into the Moderate Risk Category.
5. Conversely, my lean percentage increased from 72.6% to 75.1%.
6. My body volume decreased from 89.135 to 85.61 liters; a reduction of 3.525 liters.

Since I began testing with the Bod Pod on May 13th, 2011 I have done all the following:

1. I have reduced my body fat percentage 19.2% from 44.1 to 24.9.
2. I have lost 65.126 pounds of pure fat, down from 114.09 to 48.964 pounds.
3. I have increased my lean weight 3.027 pounds. I am still net-positive on the lean weight front.
4. I have decreased my total weight 61.92 pounds, down from 258.651 to 196.731 pounds.
5. I have decreased my body volume 31.5 liters, from 117.111 to 85.61 liters.

As we were finishing the test, the fellow conducting my test related a horror story to me. He said he had just performed a test for a woman who showed virtually no change in a month of work. She burst out in tears and challenged the whole Bod Pod methodology. He then asked if he could introduce me to some people and show them my chart. I said "sure!" After all, what would I want to hide?

We walked over to where a television production crew was setting up cameras. Evidently, this was the crew of Extreme Makeover: Weight Loss Edition. The CHLI rep introduces me to a pack of three beautiful blonds. I was a bit shy. They were just two pretty. He shows them my chart and explains the situation. They congratulate me profusely. I took a bow. I was a little overwhelmed.

Of course, there was a connection point unstated there. I am sure the woman who cried was (is) one of the subjects of the show. I am sure she was pissed at her lack of progress and public embarrassing. I am sure he was bolstering the credibility of the method by showing me off. Still, it was fun. I got another ego stroke out of that.

I just need to stop being shy around the beautiful blonds. I am not the same old fat guy I used to be. People I know don't recognize me anymore.

One other factor: The Bod Pod was undergoing routine maintenance and certification yesterday. The crew was not undergoing training. Maintenance was the reason the Bod Pod was unavailable to me yesterday. Interestingly enough, I weighed in at 197.2 pounds on the Tanita this morning and 196.731 on the Bod Pod. The gap of 0.85 pounds has now closed to just 0.469 pounds.

Interesting... one day after routine maintenance the gap has closed from 0.85 to 0.469. My Tanita is closer to accurate than I originally suspected. The Bod Pod is a little less accurate than I suspected. In any case, the gap is there, but smaller than suspected.