The Televisionary Oracle Newsletter
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Livin' Is Easy

A five-week July is almost enough time to wallow in the grain-scented splendours of summer, and to savor the voyueristic pleasure of reading your smart thoughts, wit, and contributions to the first Televisionary Oracle newsletter. It was also enough time to quit the Real Astrology's pig farm nerve center and laundry room to take two circuits through Sir Stanley Spencer's exhibit in San Francisco, commiserate with your sins, and to print out and burn a menstrual rant with some dried rosemary and silky geranium clippings.

We're still reeling from the success of last month's Be Your Own Baby Day, that happy Wednesday devoted to nothing but taking care of yourself as the best parent would. Readers wrote in to report a lie-about adventure on a Venezuelan beach; the new worlds revealed by a spin in a dump truck taken while playing hookey from work; the joy of spending a sick day at home eating nothing but apple sauce between bouts of massage therapy and hot-tubbing; and the pleaure in a slow, zen-like piecing together of the type of mobile that--if it doesn't make babies smarter--certainly gives them plenty of toe-time while lying placidly on their backs.

We celebrated wildly by eating a soft mango with a very small spoon, splurging on a long bike ride, and re-reading Dr. Spock. Rob achieved a personal best by sleeping until 4 p.m. and adding deeply to a dream journal. Only an ill-advised attempt to bathe in the kitchen sink proved unpleasurable. Look for this month's blow-out, Dare to Be Boring Day, to provide relief from the rigors of sparkling conversation on Wednesday, Aug. 19.

Also, thanks to all of those studious Cancers who sharpened their No. 2 pencils, opened their blue books, and took the Mid-Term exam. Each test has been stringently graded, the bell curve has chimed, and Rob is pleased to announce that you have all been promoted, though some of you did neglect to answer the bonus question of how many Funky Grail members can dance the Samba on the head of a love doll. . . .

Check out reader L.J. Baughman's response to the question of how she has fared with resolutions so bravely made last Dec. 31.

And don't forget to take a minute to add to our Pretty Darned Good-Looking Corpse tomfoolery as it unfolds, and to send us any tomfoolery of your own. We're in the mood to play!

--Gretchen Giles
The wild hair springing eternally
from Real Astrology's forehead


The Televisionary Oracle - August 1998


Table of Contents

Profit Sees for the Future
Rob Brezsny spit-shines his crystal ball and wipes up the truth! All the fits that's new to print!

Hype-Ocalypse Now!
Don't forget to vote for your favorite form of world annihilation. Y2K, anyone?

Being and Nothingness
Nobody enjoys being ass-to-elbows in the deep hermetic shit like Rob. Find out what it looks like, how it smells, and what it takes to spin the male menstrual cycle. Hint: Think of strawberries and beware of women's restrooms. An interview with astrologer Antero Alli.

Saving the World One Step at a Time
So you wanna be a visionary activist? Writer and astrologer Caroline Casey has got your number; plus, Mercury is retrograde: Why you should give a damn.

Pretty Darned Good-Looking Corpse
An interactive game for Televisionary Oracle fans who can extend a metaphor with the cunning skill of an expert taffy puller at a tombstone sale using the marble for a table while singing Hosannas to a coyote who wandered in for a chaw of smokeless pineapple-flavored doublemint and ended up falling in love with a New Age island cowboy from Kuala Lumpur whose desperate circus childhood has left him with a prediliction for pink popcorn, an unrequited love for a woman named Saori, a mastery of Noh theater, and an uncanny facility for the trampoline.

Food Sex
Open your mouth wide.

Letter From Yerp
Eric Francis finds himself in a sinkhole as he works to uncover Germany's nudie nun scandal.

Getting Aural About Bill
Eric Francis tells us why the president is living on the dark side of the moon

Broken Hearts Club
What is soft and pulpy and shatters too easily? Getting the pulse of our readers; plus, a cyber-love affair to remember.

It's A Date

  • Original Sin of the Month: Will boys be boys?
  • Dream of the Month: Standing up straight to Magic Johnson.
  • Saint of the Month: Sir Stanley has made his mark.
  • Haul out the calendar! Wednesday, Aug. 19, is Dare To Be Boring Day!

    Back Issues
    Did you miss us last month? No need to worry! You can still read an archived copy of issue one, volume one of the Televisionary Oracle Newsletter.


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