25 July marks the ancient Roman festival of Furrinalia, honoring the goddess (or nymph) Furrina. Detail of her relevance has been lost in the mists of time. In on-line sources she is linked to robbers and thieves, the Furies, and more likely to be accurate I suspect, to some aspect of water: spring water. A grove and spring dedicated to her was discovered on the Janiculum - one of the hills of Rome. Her festival comes two days after Neptunalia, dedicated to Neptune, originally god of fresh water, later associated with Greek god Poseidon to become god of the seas. In this list of Roman holidays Furrina is linked to "drilling operations and wells" or springs and wells. Drilling operations are a sore subject on America's Gulf coast at present. To offer up a wee prayer to Furrina on her day - can't do any harm.
It was drawn to my attention by a kindly commenter, following my recent post on Boston Legal, that actor James Spader has recently finished a run on Broadway in a play Race by David Mamet. The play continues with a fresh cast, and the part Spader played (a lawyer) has been taken by none other than Eddie Izzard. Here's the astro kicker....Spader and Izzard share a birthday : 7 February, though there are 2 years between. Coincidence? Probably - but a good one. Eddie Izzard will do an excellent job in Race, I feel sure, though to my mind he'll never better his part in Across the Universe - he defined Mr. Kite for all time.
Saw Despicable Me this week. Enjoyed it. What has stayed in my mind is a conversation between Gru (the anti-hero) and his mother, voiced by Julie Andrews. In the relevant scene Gru describes his inventions and successes for Mom's approval. She responds to each with a dismissive "Fnyeh",wonderfully intoned. We thought this must be a form of the irritating "meh" - which has entered the language - and dictionary - recently. "Fnyeh" is much better, done properly it's far more expressive. A little googling tells me that "fnyeh" has Yiddish origins, whereas "meh" seems to hare originated with The Simpsons on TV. We've taken to doing "fnyehs" all over the place since our visit to the cinema.
See Michael Wex's site
http://michaelwex.com/2010/06/feh-and-fnyeh/
What are most people saying?....."Fnyeh".
AND....British cartoonist Ronald Searle's rendition of LEO from Searle's Zodiac. He has featured the "Leo hair". It's often thought that people with emphasis on zodiac sign Leo in their natal charts have plentiful and lustrous hair. I've known a few who had plentiful and lustrous shiny pates too though.
It was drawn to my attention by a kindly commenter, following my recent post on Boston Legal, that actor James Spader has recently finished a run on Broadway in a play Race by David Mamet. The play continues with a fresh cast, and the part Spader played (a lawyer) has been taken by none other than Eddie Izzard. Here's the astro kicker....Spader and Izzard share a birthday : 7 February, though there are 2 years between. Coincidence? Probably - but a good one. Eddie Izzard will do an excellent job in Race, I feel sure, though to my mind he'll never better his part in Across the Universe - he defined Mr. Kite for all time. 
Saw Despicable Me this week. Enjoyed it. What has stayed in my mind is a conversation between Gru (the anti-hero) and his mother, voiced by Julie Andrews. In the relevant scene Gru describes his inventions and successes for Mom's approval. She responds to each with a dismissive "Fnyeh",wonderfully intoned. We thought this must be a form of the irritating "meh" - which has entered the language - and dictionary - recently. "Fnyeh" is much better, done properly it's far more expressive. A little googling tells me that "fnyeh" has Yiddish origins, whereas "meh" seems to hare originated with The Simpsons on TV. We've taken to doing "fnyehs" all over the place since our visit to the cinema.See Michael Wex's site
http://michaelwex.com/2010/06/feh-and-fnyeh/
What are most people saying?....."Fnyeh".
AND....British cartoonist Ronald Searle's rendition of LEO from Searle's Zodiac. He has featured the "Leo hair". It's often thought that people with emphasis on zodiac sign Leo in their natal charts have plentiful and lustrous hair. I've known a few who had plentiful and lustrous shiny pates too though.
