poor advice

ASTROLIQUOR for September 14-20—What the stars say you should drink!

My Fellow Inebriates,

Here’s your booze horoscope:

Aries, one of your peeps is jealous of you. Whether it’s your liquor cabinet, your life partner, or the way you sleep in all day, that envy will come to a boil this week. When you ease off the Malibu and realize your ex-chum is bad-mouthing you, you’re gonna freak. And Aries…as usual there is a bar fight in the offing. Don’t let it happen! Stay inside! Close the drapes! Drink more Malibu!

Taurus, your house is looking shabby. That couch you thought was so wicked cool way back when…those pastel walls…that shaggy carpet. It’s all been barfed on one too many times, and it’s rum-and-stomach-acid odour is so rank that not even your Jehovah’s Witness visitors care to stay and chat. Find a friend with good judgment, who’s not pissed on rum, to help you redecorate.

Not only are you a little psychologically uneven these days, Gemini, you’re bored. Time to find some excitement, and the stars are pointing either toward the bar scene or…the health club. (Sometimes the stars just like to hedge their bets.) The choice is a no-brainer—get yourself to the nearest pub and order a row of tequila shots. Behave obnoxiously until you’re no longer bored.

The stars call for heavy socializing this week, Cancer. You might even add to your friend list if you open your mind. Hell, why not open your booze shelves to the neighborhood and have a house-wrecker party? Open the door and scream, “Vanilla vodka!” and see if anyone comes running. Whoever does might end up sleeping in your bathtub, especially on Friday, Saturday, or Sunday.

Leo, you’ll meet someone with an unusual accent. Try not to be a douche. You sound pretty funny yourself when you’re burping up blackberry liqueur and rum. This is the opportunity to start a new friendship—possibly featuring a leather thong. Enjoy it until December when planet Mars goes apeshit in your relationship house and one of you takes out a restraining order. The good news is that a friend with flesh-eating disease is going to be okay.

Friendships become increasingly precious as we age, Virgo. Why not get in touch with an old friend or two? Especially if you severed contact suddenly or on bad terms, now’s the time to reconnect. For instance, what about your ex? The best approach is to fill up on a half-decent blended whiskey…say, six ounces with some soda and bitters…then pick up the phone. Yeah, do it!

Libra, if you’re in a helping profession, you can expect a great week. Everyone is so happy to see you; there’s not enough of you to go around. Perhaps you’re doing your job too well. After all, if your job description includes changing adult diapers, you don’t want to be too popular. Try incorporating gin and creme de menthe into your work day; it should help you avoid being specially requested.

Sometimes coworkers can be so critical, Scorpio, especially the ones who are gunning for you right now. Take a deep breath and ignore them. What are they going to do, report you? They don’t even have justification, do they? Doesn’t everyone (besides you) arrive at work with a Thermos of Purple Honker (yes! equal parts strawberry liqueur and Maui Blue Hawaiian schnapps with or without 7-up)? Don’t worry that your nitpicky colleagues might get you fired; you’ll win something next week.

Sagittarius, Irish whisky is the thief of time. You know you have a project begging your attention, and yet it’s so awesome to combine three parts Bushmill’s with two parts Bailey’s over ice in an old-fashioned glass. (Okay, so the stars are saying you need to tackle your project, that it will be rewarding, etc. But the stars are very far away.)

You don’t usually talk about your sexy time, Capricorn. But given enough dark rum, you’ll express all kinds of random preferences…Which will work out for you this week if you cross paths with an adventurous Virgo. Who knows what you’ll get up to…it will be very quick and messy though. Others will frown on it. Give them some dark rum and they will understand.

Aquarius, what is your job? Like, what do you do? Is it what you always thought you’d do? Usually it isn’t. And this week you realize you haven’t been following your heart. You won’t have time over the next three months to really figure this out, but that’s okay because you’ll have too much Goldschlager in your system to act on your conclusions. Yes, you can get drunk on that shit. You just need a strong stomach.

Pisces, change is on the horizon. Usually change (for you) involves a move (from home to jail, for example), the loss of routine (your job), or predation in the wild (other homeless people banging on your cardboard box). But this time it’s different. Your life is on a big uptick, Pisces! You have new maturity and new perspective, and Saturday may even introduce a new romantic interest. Yay! If only you had some booze, but the stars are saying no this week. Stupid stars.

ASTROLIQUOR for September 7-13—What the stars say you should drink!

My Fellow Inebriates,

Here’s your booze horoscope:

Aries, even if you’ve been feeling your age lately, this week brings new energy. Whatever age you were happiest, that’s the way you’ll feel. Hark back to relatively mature times and you may find yourself sipping a Grey Goose martini. But good luck if you long for less mature times—you could end up shotgunning beers at the park. With apologies for gross stereotyping, this is a kick-ass way to feel young.

Taurus, this is the week to complete important negotiations. The terms won’t get more favorable, so sign the documents already. The sooner you get this boring task done, the sooner you can hit that box of white wine that’s been giving you come-hither looks. Mix it up with some Galiano (after you finish the financial stuff).

When things are tough, Gemini, the stars advise hitting the bars and finding a stranger to listen to your troubles. A real psychologist would just cost you money ($100 and hour? or four bottles of Smirnoff?…you do the math), plus they’d have all sorts of rules about bringing flasks to the office, etc.  Who needs professionals? Any stranger with a sufficiently high blood-alcohol level will be happily regaled by you.

Life feels hard right now, Cancer, but you just need some perspective. The world is full of real problems, and you…well, your worst hardship is having to settle for a mocktail when you want a cocktail. But the stars are recommending mocktails to you this week. What total BS. The stars are zillions of light years away, and arguably their recommendations are therefore zillions of years old. Read no further; go and get drunk.

Leo, you suddenly realize you’ve been living behind a façade. Look at yourself in the mirror…who the hell are you anyway? Getting to know the real you may take time and involve a stack of gooey self-help books, which sounds like totally boring busy-work. Instead of engaging in an uphill battle to know thyself, learn to love the fake you—then mix yourself a glitzy gin-and-Goldschlager to celebrate the joys of artificiality.

You’ve worked so hard, Virgo. You’ve slaved away and put everything you had into a project at work, only to receive faint praise. Nor are you happy with the results. As for what your boss thinks…you might need a cardboard box. You certainly need a supply of Hypnotiq, Blue Curacao, and Malibu. Because when you’re blue, there’s nothing like a blue drink.

Libra, you are fretting about small things. Cut yourself some slack. With all your worrying, you’ve barely noticed that you have a well-dressed admirer. The stars (which don’t like being wrong) say this potential flirtation features an Aries, an Aquarius, or a Gemini. Talk about hedging your bets, stars. But they also call for shots of Bailey’s and butterscotch schnapps, so you can’t very well argue.

Your personal life is out of control, Scorpio. Since this is fairly normal for you, there’s no need to sweat it. Distract yourself by rearranging the furniture or discovering what you get when you combine red wine and rum in equal parts, then toss some random fruits into it (the booze, not the furniture). Maintain a permanent vat of this on your coffee table and you’ll never want for visitors.

Sagittarius, you get a break from being designated driver, which calls for a big Stolichnaya-Jagermeister bender. But don’t get so hammered that you won’t realize it when a drunken friend tries to get behind the wheel. Peel that moron out of his/her car, moralize drunkenly, and call a cab. Drinking is awesome—we don’t need it spoilt by idiots.

A charity hits you up for money, Capricorn. If you don’t agree with its message, don’t feel pressured to give. If you do agree, by all means give, but save some cash for the liquor cabinet. Maybe you can volunteer time rather than money? Otherwise you won’t be able to afford this week’s celestial recommendation: Vana Tallinn. Plus you’ll meet cool new people volunteering (maybe an interesting Leo). But watch out for “frenemies” this week!

Aquarius, are you by any chance an organ donor? Consider filling out a card this week; practically everything barring your liver should be usable. If that’s a little too morbid for you, why not donate blood? Unless it’s full of rum. Come to think of it, maybe you could just be nice to people this week…which you usually are anyway. Hmmm, what do the stars suggest, then? Just go and get a haircut or something.

Pisces, this week features unlikely meetings with people you thought you’d never see again. If you’ve been hankering for social connection, this is a good thing. If you’re in the witness protection program, this is a bad thing. Accordingly, be careful whether you stay in or go outside. If you have a partner, life may get turbulent this week. Smooth it out with as much Kahlua as you can absorb.

ASTROLIQUOR for August 31 to September 6—What the stars say you should drink!

My Fellow Inebriates,

Here’s your booze horoscope:

Although bar fights are nothing strange to you, Aries, you can expect a rough one this week. You’ll beat the crap out a Libra, which will give you a sense of satisfaction, even though you’ll eventually have to apologize (possibly through some sort of restorative justice mechanism prescribed by court…OMG, what the hell are the stars saying you’re going to do to this Libra??) Is this what comes of combining tequila, rum, vodka, triple sec, gin, and Razzmatazz? Holy shit, Aries, I don’t like your stars this week.

Taurus, watch your diet this week. If you cut back on solid foods you can accommodate a big vat of eggnog. In fact, you should have an eggnog party on Sunday. You’ll need a bunch of egg yolks plus whole cream, some other stuff, and two cups of rum. Mmmmmm…totally worth skipping solids. In fact, if you really want to cut calories, leave out all the ingredients except the rum. That’s the best kind of eggnog.

You often listen without hearing, Gemini, but if you pay close attention to the stars, they’re telling you to layer equal parts of Kahlua, Bailey’s, and creme de cacao in a shot glass (or a tumbler), top with a splash of vodka, and ahhhhhhh! It won’t improve your listening abilities, especially if you opt for the tumbler, but it sure says “early weekend.”

Your persuasive powers peak this week, Cancer. Try not to be evil; you are very influential right now. 😉 Weirdly enough, the stars don’t recommend alcohol (because they’re worried about you being evil), but I trust you. So go ahead and mix up some tequila with milk. Stir (don’t shake) and slam it back, then have an orange wedge. This is all the evil you need.

Leo, someone’s crushing on you but you’re distracted and you totally miss it. It’s uncharacteristic for you to lose out on a mating opportunity, but if you pay attention, you’ll finally notice this interested Gemini. Maybe if you just lay off the cherry vodka for a while, you’ll notice all kinds of people and things. You might even remember to brush your teeth.

Try to avoid snap judgments about people this week, Virgo. Outward appearances aren’t trustworthy, and you’ve been fine-tuning your intuition for a while now, so dig a little deeper when you’re assessing someone. Meanwhile, others are assessing you. You’ve been going through a lot of mental changes lately, both positive (shedding cares about material wealth) and negative (waking up with the Jagermeister shakes). The stars suggest cutting the Jager with Red Bull (dumbass stars).

Libra, you’re feeling the weight of obligations, and noticing when others don’t step up to fulfill theirs. You have to know this makes you annoying and, depending how much you broadcast your resentment, maybe even a douche. Just don’t let the half-hearted performance of other people put you off achieving your own goals. If you must, screw other people and have a bottle of Tanqueray to yourself.

Determination is your key word this week, Scorpio. Whatever you set out to do, you can do it—even things you normally suck at. Now’s the time to ask for a raise or go after a better job. You are more powerful than Xenu this week (or at least Tom Cruise). Don’t let this special astrological power pass! Go after your heart’s desire, then celebrate with some Chambord.

Sagittarius, the hard times are ending, but not just yet. You can just see the clearing up ahead, so hang tough. Like a rotten parting shot, this bleak time will end with something in your house breaking. Don’t worry, it’s not critical; you can live without a vacuum cleaner or a dishwasher. So long as it’s not a bar shelf! OMG, it would suck if all your bottles crashed and broke. There you’d be in a puddle of glass shards and Southern Comfort, slurping your precious booze out of the carpet. (Make sure your bar shelf is secure!)

You go berserk for some art this week, Capricorn. Whatever it is—sculpture, sketch, painting—you must have it immediately. But be careful with your money; something in house house will break this week, and if you’ve spent all your funds on art, how will you pay for the repair? (And how will you maintain your tequila levels?)

Aquarius, you’ll meet a fascinating, sexually charged stranger this week, and after a couple of bourbons he/she will no longer be a stranger. In fact, you’ll discover all sort of mutual friends and interests. The more intimate you become, the more similarities will emerge. And just wait till you see each other’s photo albums. OMG! You’re related.

Pisces, you’ve got nothing going on this week. Nada. The stars used it all up on the other signs. This pisses you off, because you hoped for some action—an affair maybe, or a flirtation. Nope. Nothing. Just you by yourself. Lots of people like being by themselves. They pick up a book or watch a movie or call some friends. But you don’t feel like it, and the stars are laying on a walloping dose of self-pity. So you alternate shots of lime Bacardi with belts of Corona. (Sounds okay to me.)