Last night I took one of my Maneki Neko cats in to show Andy. They are called lucky, welcoming or fortune cats and are mainly made of ceramic. They actually originated in Japan hundreds of years ago and are a bobtail cat. Cats were held in such high reverence that they were adorned with bibs, collars and bells.

Many people think the cat is waving, but he is actually beckoning with his paw. If the right paw is up he is beckoning wealth while the left beckons customers.

The cat is often shown holding a gold coin called a Koban which was used during the Edo period in Japan.  As the cat is a symbol of good fortune and luck they were turned into what we know as ‘piggy banks’, somewhere safe and lucky to keep money.

Chinese Banks, restaurants and shops display the cats prominently and they are often found near lottery machines to encourage people to buy tickets and bring luck.

Four things you can’t recover:

The Stone………after the throw.              The word………after it’s said.
 

The occasion………after it’s missed.      The time………..after it’s gone.

I have taken in various items over the weeks to show Andy – Tibetan cymbals, copper dowsing rods and a money plant. Andy asked me to bring in an item this week that I use  a lot, so I took in a lump of Rose Quartz, it was like ‘show day’ at school. The piece I have (above) is in its natural state, not polished, it is rough and I find it very tactile. I wrapped the quartz up in a scarf so Andy had no idea what it was, so he was a little apprehensive!

I use Rose if I am clearing Geopathic Stress and keep it next to my computer to absorb any negativity. You can get polished Rose Quartz hearts and use them to attract romance into your life as well.

I ‘recharge’ all my stones regularly, always after using for a specific reason. To do this I rinse it, sprinkle with sea salt, rinse again and place out in the sunshine for 4 hours – if I want a more yin feel then I place outside in the moonlight in the days preceding a full moon.

There was a New Moon last night, so for all of you wanting to ‘wish’ for something now is the time to do it.

I would like to have been on Easter Island this morning to witness the Solar Eclipse, the viewing conditions were perfect and it looked awesome on the news coverage. NASA has a great web site where you can find out details of upcoming Solar and Lunar Eclipses.

I had my house on the market for a while so decided to take a ‘clinical’ look at everything. It is not a good idea to Feng Shui your own property normally – you miss too many things – but I decided to move a few items indoors to ‘help’ the sale along and last week had an offer made, which I have accepted. Looking at all the stats the average time to sell a property is anything from 6-9 months. I sold mine in three and a half months – not bad going.

Am getting excited as tomorrow at 6am (GMT) I am doing an interview with a writer and astrologer in LA – it will 10pm her time. She has asked me to talk about Feng Shui and I Ching astrology and the interview will be available as a podcast on her web site. I will give you more details if our communications ‘across the pond’ are successful.

I had a wonderful time on Andy’s show last night, we have such a laugh together.

I took my dowsing rods in last night and checked the studio for Geopathic Stress, I found nothing, but then I never really expected to as the studio has a nice feel to it.

The first call was from a guy called Colin who lives in the middle of France!! Andy really embraced the call and frantically hunted for French music to set the tone.  Colin has been working in France for a while and his partner cajoled him into phoning. He kept his cards close to his chest and was not giving too much away, he thought I was going to make ‘predictions’ instead of just giving him the facts.

When I got home I had an email from a lady in LA. She is a writer and astrologer and she wants to do an interview with me to play on her internet radio station which is picked up worldwide – have emailed her back for some more info. I was looking at her site and love the way she writes her astro predictions – very down to earth and no waffle. Will let you have more details later.

A couple of good friends popped round last night for a quick catch up.

One of them was talking about a neighbour who is “devastated” as she has been given 2 years to live. Now the lady in question has been ill for quite some time and has been told all along that the long term prognosis is not good, but now her world has fallen apart because she now has been given a time scale.

The thing is we are all on the “countdown” whether we like it or not, as they say the only 2 certain things in this life are death and taxes so it is no good ignoring the inevitable.  

When you are young 20 seems so old and anyone over 30 is positively past it. When you hit 30 middle age seems an eternity away, but in reality if you look at the proverbial three score years and ten then 35 is middle age.  

As you get older the years do seem to go quicker, (in just a few weeks the supermarkets will have all their Christmas goodies in trust me). When you are young you add extra on to your age, you are proud to be getting older. Children announce that they are 6 and a half or 9 and three quarters, you then want to be a teenager, 18 & 21…… then it stops! Birthdays after that don’t have the same significance, and people seem to go through an almighty crisis as they hit the ‘big’ birthdays.

Age is just a number, enjoy the time you have, as they say treat every day as your last, and today is the first day of the rest of your life.

None of us know if we have 2 minutes, days, weeks or years to go so remember to tell those important people that you love them and enjoy every moment you have.

So, Andy Murray has been knocked out of Wimbledon by Spaniard Rafael “Rafa” Nadal.  Now I must admit I like a lot of the female population do have a bit of a soft spot for Rafa, but it has nothing to do of course with his good looks!!

Rafa is Earth Birth Star number 5, when he won Wimbledon in 2008 his star was visiting the 9^th Palace – fame, recognition and a time of being in the spotlight. Last year he could not defend his title due to a knee problem, he was also in the 1 Water Palace – deep mid winter.

Andy Murray’s Birth Star is number 4 – Wind –anything from stillness to hurricane – he finds his star residing in the 1^st Palace this year as he is a year younger than Rafa.

 Andy has not had a good year overall so far, but hopefully he will come back even stronger next year – his Birth star will be visiting the 2^nd Palace leaving deep winter behind and slowly progressing towards spring.