Mercury turns Retrograde in Virgo next week and while the Daily Mystic for Friday will have a more granular + detailed take on this, here is the gist: I’m not a Mercury Retro alarmist but…if my ten hours on hold/in help desk hell this last week is any indicator*, this will be one for the ages.
Other Indicators? The retrograde is in Mercury-affiliated Virgo and the repeat-trines to Jupiter, while rad for general genius, abundance-generating and sensational rapport, will also amplify any glitches. There is the potential for practically comedic fuq-ups amidst fantastic connectivity and huge dialogue.
Imagine you’re doing big macro Jupiter jive – wow-factor chemistry, riffing off one another’s ideas, gaining maximum momentum etc – but are interrupted by a micro-factor turned rogue. Eg: a mis-spelling on an identity document or something. It’s that sort of energy.
Fortunately, Mercury is also trine asteroid Minerva – the Wisdom Goddess – until September, making the first leg of this Mercury Retro brilliant for fact-finding and knowledge gains at least.
My help desk hell was actually sort of funny aside from the time suck – Having sensibly surrendered my ancient workhorse of a highly customized Mac ahead of this Mercury Retro in Virgo, I had some issues with the replacement. Eg: the region was set correctly in Australia but it wouldn’t budge from Pacific Time Zone.
It sounds minor but it means when you go to schedule things, you see weird error messages with warnings like “Alert: You are in the future and cannot use this setting.”
So it had to be fixed – cue surreal conversation with lines like this:
Support: You’re going to need to reset the NVRAM but don’t worry, I will talk you through this.
Me: I just googled – it won’t work on an M2 silicon chip.
Support: You trust Google more?
Me: Well,…
Support: Actually you are correct about this so we won’t mention that again. So you say you are in Australia but your computer has a Pacific Time Zone…
Me: Yes.
Support: Are you sure you are not in California, Vancouver or Seattle?
Me: Yes.
I could tell he still doubted me – if I had kangaroos or a view of the Sydney Opera House, I’d have uploaded a quick pic to prove location but I found the solution by mistake, mid-escalation to ‘senior engineers.’
Then there was an Internet Service Provider issue where I couldn’t access my own server site in the USA but the same glitch was also affecting performers trying to upload material to their Only Fans account and people who play the online game Fortnite.
This prompted an even more ridiculous dialogue in which the support person finally got to the call and was (inexplicably, at first) responding with lines like “I know you want to play your game.”
Naturally I was taking all this in on as existential commentary so the dialogue veered way off course before I figured out what was going on.
When I said I wasn’t a gamer but was blocked from getting to my server, the tone altered and they became gratifyingly accommodating, presumbly because I’d been recategorized as hypothetically hot because of my non-existent Only Fans account.
It’s funny now but the frustration factor and time-suck were real. Oh and I also had to set my computer language to Polish to prevent intrusive red underlines on words deemed incorrect. You can turn off auto-correct but the actual spell checker can no longer be disabled, only disarmed via trickery.
So no matter how mad your schedule or however low your tolerance is for this sort of thing, create time to scan your scene for any potential fuqery and fix it asap, before Mercury is actually Retrograde on August 23/24.
Thoughts? Have you noticed any strange or absurd mercurial scenarios since August 4?
Image: Helmut Newton – YSL 1985
*Why is this an indicator? Because Mercury has been in the shadow of the retrograde since August 4 – that is, it’s reached the 8° point that it will later retrograde back to. Dialogue, resolve or agreements struck within this zone are likely to flip, reverse or reveal unexpected caveats.
It’s also a good time to gauge the tone of the ‘proper Mercury Retro’ – you can see the potential fault lines. Eg; a loose keyhole, bureaucratic bumbling, hints of a security lapse or that a relevant person may be mis-interpreting your message.
What planet rules the pompous shouting out into any crowd of personally unknown persons to “wake up”?
Mars?
Pre-Mercury-Retro-Update; bathroom door unable to be opened – handle moves but door immobile. Fortunately I’m on the outside and it’s quickly established that a locksmith is required – its not one of those diy ingenuity jobs.
Anyway, it turns out that the internal latch has imploded (not a technical term) which happens BUT the locksmith said “this is the fourth one of these I’ve done this week…” looking flabbergastered.
I asked if that was unusual and he said there would usually be about four to six a year.
Be mindful of keys and locks people!
Here’s is a very apt Mercury in Virgo prelude situation for you…. last night in NY state since we are experiencing both extreme heat and cold fronts simultaneously (hello effects of climate instability & solar maximum lol) and the electrical grid seems to not have been updated since Lincoln was in office lol, our power went off and on at midnight (wtf!) and the glitch sent all our electronics into a freaky state which brought me right back to my after-after —Neptunian-party-days with lights strobing on & off and all smart devices only able to get our two words before shorting put again. We fell asleep…… woke up this morning to zero internet connection and the modem has actually completely stopped powering up. It’s completely cooked lol. Pls do not let this be a warning to my whole Mercury retro in Virgo period 🫠
Wow, did it resolve?!
Ah yes, it’s my online bank app. It has shut itself twice this month (I have to go to the bank to open it). On the plus side, I finally got the refund from a book that got lost in the mail during previous Mercury retro.
I’m currently negotiating & planning the logistics of a 2 month stay in Italy later this year. Should be fun fun fun… (I have Uranus-Neptunus conj. in 1st house in exact opposition to Mercury, the doctors call it ADHD but I call it living in constant Mercury retro hehe).
“Alert: You are in the future and cannot use this setting.”
T-shirt?
Yes! Perhaps with a faded out shimmer of Johnny Mnemonic?
Ok so I re-read Stella’s quote of your post in a Keanu voice and now it all makes sense (probably thanks to a John Wick movie binge also)
I once accidentally opened a hidden keyboard I didn’t know existed and thought I’d entered another dimension.
I want one!
I’ve noticed little microbursts over the past two weeks. It’s been interesting, but enough to put me on alert. Getting some bursts of fun and interesting ideas for my art so buckle up buttercup, we’re in for a RIDE.
Disarming a hardwired spell-checker using trickery does have pisces-virgo goes head-to-head energy
Also the tarot kept giving me cups cards and similar sweetness in the 6th house position. As I’m not really in a health-regime /scrub the skirting boards space right now, I figured there must be general positivity in my day to day space. Then I had to book a specialist appointment only to discover that my doctor is completely dreamy, and I am trying very hard to maintain polite decorum while my Venus in Aries is frothing in the background out of earshot as Neptune continues to sprinkle violet glitter everywhere. I have prescribed myself a teaspoon of salt with the Venus fluff to remedy the delusion. I never bring enough snacks on these fantasy excursions and do rather wear myself out… I think he might be a water sign (cancerian eyes) but I’ve been wrong before.
‘(…) the support person (…) was responding with lines like “I know you want to play your game.” Naturally I was taking all this in on as existential commentary…’
I am really sorry you had to go through this, Mystic, but this had me laughing out loud, it is truly funny! “I know you want to play your game”
Right! Who doesn’t??
Skull-duggery with formatting. MS Word would not play nice. Put the student assessment notification into this new format they said, easy they said, all of the classes they said. It took me all of my skills and patience (I’m gen x and even a gen y know it all gave up) copy, paste, as text only, save as PDF edit pages out. Every step kept changing the formatting to landscape or doubling up the tables. Page numbers started on about page 4. The first page school icon disappeared…Nightmare. I sent one to the printer to retrieve tomorrow but I think I’ll get someone else to proof it. One down three to go. We won’t mention version control. Mercury I can hear you chuckling!
YES! My computer updated itself to Windows 11 and then somehow totally lost all of my research notes for my PhD. They have miraculously reappeared (and been IMMEDIATELY triple backed up)… but there are all sorts of shenanigans happening with the OneNote / OneDrive situation…
I managed to get the above fixed and now my calendar is not syncing correctly between my phone and computer…
Fixed the above and now my little time management app and website blocker is malfunctioning…
Hi!! Thank you for all your articles and insights. To me sounds like you were communicating with Ai technology, not a real person