ATHENA - the Smart One Who Never Got The Guys Until She Got Contacts (March 21-April 19)

 

Are you the only one who can't stand Christmas? Maybe you're just the only one who's complaining out loud. It's kind of like how everyone can't stand that 5 year old in your building with the voice that makes chalk on a blackboard sound like the tweeting of songbirds by comparison, but no one dares to say anything or even share a good eye-roll when the kid throws a tantrum because his shoe is untied. Take comfort in the fact that there are legions of people out there who, like you, just wish it was February already so that you could return the flannel nightgown you're going to get from your sister-in-law and get a black leather mini-skirt.

 

 

 

JUNO - the One Who Says She's Happily Married (April 20-May 20)

 

You are way ahead on your Christmas shopping this year in that you realize it's December and you know you have 18 relatives who you have to get gifts for, plus 3 good friends, not to mention your boss who makes five times your salary and who you know has his secretary choose your present. (This can work out well for you, as long as he's having an affair with his secretary and you know about it.) Recognize that each day that passes, the stores will only be more crowded and the gifts more expensive, so unless you had the foresight to book a trip to the Caribbean, you'd better head for the mall.

 

 

APHRODITE - the Impossibly Thin-Thighed (May 21-June 21)

 

You'll find yourself entangled in some potentially perilous circumstances when you wrap your left leg and part of your head in a string of electric lights in an attempt to decorate your 8-foot spruce. Fortunately, you are alone at home so no one is there to see you (except the cat who is used to this), but unfortunately, you are alone at home and seem to have tied yourself to the ladder. This will be an amusing story someday! You really only have to worry if you plugged the cable in. Oh.

 

 

 

DIANA - the Bargain Hunter (June 22-July 22)

 

The Holiday sales are already starting and as "the Bargain Hunter" sign you are, you feel obliged to spend every moment shopping. However, this month, whether it's at the mall or in one of the big department stores, it seems like your fellow shoppers are out to get you. Grow a pair, girl! Stop being so forgiving with that elderly lady who grabbed that scarf out of your hands, or that little girl who kicked you in the shins on her way to the Bratz display. Give the paramedics a holiday gift: knock someone down and make them bleed! That's what we mean by the holiday spirit!

 

 

 

DEMETER - the Condom Bearer (July 23-August 22)

 

The 11th through the 14th brings an obsession with scotch tape, which doesn't diminish until the wee hours of the 25th. From the 10th through the 24th, you will be anxious and panicky and break out in a rash every time you hear the "Here Comes Santa Claus" song in the building elevator. The 25th brings much noise, some laughter and a huge fight with a sibling who has never gotten over the fact that you got the stuffed pony and he got the Science Project kit when you were kids. A coniferous tree becomes a looming fire hazard in your living room.

 

 

 

VESTA - the Lover of Laundry (August 23-September 22)

 

Fat Saturn is planning to dress up like Santa Claus and visit your house, even though you're Jewish and have always been kind of afraid of the fat guy and his black jack boots and twinkling eyes and ravenous appetites and interest in small children and animals with antlers. It's true that you have always had a Christmas tree alongside your menorah, but you've also always made sure you lived in homes without chimneys just in case all those rumors are true. Don't forget that unlike Santa Claus, Saturn is not into cookies and milk but would prefer a nice single malt Scotch and a cheese ball.

 

 

 

PERSEPHONE - the One Who Never Wears White After Labor Day (September 23-October 23)

 

Oops! There goes all your money into the maw of gift giving and compensation for ignoring your relatives all the rest of the year. How much is it worth to you not to have to see your mother-in-law and endure her judgmental comments for a whole year? It might mean a Longines watch, or even a real Pashmina shawl. Your brothers are as motivated as you to avoid the rest of the family so they will only cost you a pair of leather gloves and a DVD of "The Office" and it might end up being an even trade. At this stage of life you realize that there is no compensation great enough to get out of seeing your parents for a whole year, although they might be swayed by a flat screen TV. Make it high def and you can probably get out of town by the 26th.

 

 

 

LEDA - the Wearer of Tu Tus (October 24-November 21)

 

Finally this year you are going to have a date on New Year's Eve! Somehow you've tricked some guy into asking you out! How many years have you spent wondering what the hell you're going to do on that most ridiculous of holidays (second only to Arbor Day)? This year you don't have to spend it with your single girlfriends baking cookies and watching "The Notebook", no, this year you may actually get to wear that dress you bought at the Missoni sample sale that makes you look like you might want to straddle a pole right after dinner, and you may actually get to have sex! Enjoy yourself and don't forget to cut off the tags!

 

 

 

ECHO - the One With All the Good Gossip (November 22-December 21)

 

Your therapist has finally unearthed the source of those headaches you've been getting since you were six years old, starting at the end of November and lasting until January the third. It's that you resent your parents for having had sex one March many years ago, resulting in you being born in December, and for the rest of your life getting "combined" Birthday/Christmas presents. For all these years, you've walked around in a funk on Christmas day as your siblings and friends crowed over their Christmas presents, and you've dealt with a stocking full of "symbolic" gifts like flavored Chapstick and Starbucks mugs. Your therapist would talk it over with you, but he's away for the holidays.

 

 

 

PANDORA - the One Who Always Overpacks (December 22-January 19)

 

It's holiday time and yet you can't seem to get in the mood. Mercury intersects with Jupiter and they both apologize profusely but this has nothing to do with you unless you own a body shop that specializes in BMWs. And that's just the problem. Everyone else's planets seem to be attentive and helpful; steering them toward decisions and futures that are full of promise and joy, while yours are getting drunk and picking up lesser orbiting bodies and taking them to low-rent constellations for cheap inter-galactic encounters. You need to remind your heavenly influences that the Hubble telescope has cameras and if they don't start steering some joy your way, they're going to see their dark sides on YouTube.

 

 

 

PSYCHE - the Headcase (January 20-February 18)

 

Health problems will plague you later this month mostly as a result of some bad eggnog you drink at your neighbor's Christmas gathering. This will work out nicely closer to New Year's when you need to fit into that outfit that is a size 6 since you are actually just hanging onto the outside fringes of a size 8. Social obligations, along with solid food, will be hard to stomach until the 24th. After the 24th, you can eat solid food, but social obligations will still make you nauseous.

 

 

 

PHOEBE - the Unlikely Sit-Com Star (February 19-March 20)

 

Your Christmas wish list becomes irrelevant when Paris Hilton enlightens you as to the suffering of others and the superficiality of Western Culture by planning a trip to Rwanda to explore first-hand the suffering of others, and then canceling it on account of her finding out it was in Africa. How can you want a gift for yourself when you already have so much and Paris Hilton has so much more than you? You'll never catch up to her, so quit while you're ahead and try to empathize with others. The least you can do is tip that poor delivery guy more than your miserly $2.00.

 

 

Bonus Horoscope (for those who didn't like their own)

 

THALIA - the Upper West Side Theater (aka the Leonard Nimoy)

 

You are not the least bit surprised as U.S. President Bush shows the whole world that he is an idiot, again, when he announces that he can't think of a good reason to invade Iran after all since, although in 2003 we had definitive evidence that they were developing a nuclear weapons program, it turns out that the report was all wrong. Add it to the stack of other definitive reports that turned out to be complete bullshit, like we were going to suffer an Anthrax attack that would make a Colorado snowstorm look like dandruff on your Uncle Irving's shoulder, and Iraq had weapons of mass destruction. This brings you great joy, since now we only have to worry about invading North Korea who, another definitive report states, has giant remote controlled robot-killer machines that are set to be launched on North America in the year 2008.