Cranky Large Medium reading, 23 July

Go away.

Why did you wake me? Let me crawl back under my ratty blanket and restack those "Z"s. Why won't you go? What cruel streak in you keeps you standing in front of me? Grumble grumble a medium tries to sleep in once in a while, and what do we get? Gimme gimme gimme. I wanna reeeeeeeading. Well, fine then. If I give it to you, you'lll be happy and leave me alone? Swell. Here you are:

You are energetic, vivacious and rather talkative. Will you sit down and be quiet while I do this, please? You like the social scene and desperately want to be the center of everybody's attention, taking an active part in all undertakings. You are not demonstrative in your love, probably because you talk too much to ever figure out the more important (nonverbal) methods of communication. You will therefore probably never find a mate who will understand you.

Are you happy, now? Of course not. Will you sit down and be quiet, please? Criminy. At least you can look on the bright side of things -- you aren't really able to sit down and be quiet. That's quite the opposite problem from that plaguing these people, all of whom, on this date in history, were permanently silenced: John Joachim Zubly, Roger Sherman, Andries Pretorius, Hiram Ulysses Grant, Cordell Hull, Mohammed Zahir Shah, George Edwards, Isaac Singer, Sir William Ramsay, Adam Czerniakow, Henry Hallett Dale, Kenjiro Takayanagi, Qiu Chuji, Saint Birgitta, Gilbert Tennent, John Day, Eudora Welty, Chaim Potok, Domenico Scarlatti, Keith Godchaux, D. W. Griffith, Robert J. Flaherty, Montgomery Clift, Van Heflin, Vic Morrow, Leo McKern, Tenby Davies, Thomas Percy, Pancho Villa, Glenn Curtiss,

and Ron Miller.

For once in your life, will you be quiet and go?
Happy birthday, anyway.

Cranky Large Medium reading, 22 July

Go away.

Why are you still here? What is it that keeps you from going, when there is a perfectly good gate, and a lovely path beyond? Are you mad? Are you sad? Are you gathering moss? Oh, you just want a reading. Well, I think I can accommodate you, today. As long as you promise that, once I give it to you, you will leave me alone again. Naturally. Well, here you are, anyway:

You have a blithe disposition, mostly because you remain clueless as to anything of any important. It is recommended that you marry young, so as to not be a complete disappointment to your partner. You are friendly, appreciate the good in others and are fair and generous in every way. If only you had something worthwhile to offer others.

Are you happy, now? Of course not. But at least you have the ability to look on the bright side (while you're appreciating the good in this). You're still alive and kicking, which beats the heck out of what these people have, as, on this date in history, they all kicked the habit of breathing: John Zápolya, Hugh Drysdale, Napoleon II, Auguste Marmont, James B. McPherson, Cassius Clay, Giuseppe Piazzi, John A. Roebling, Sir Sandford Fleming, Jokichi Takamine, Reginald Fessenden, Lawrence of Brindisi, Pope Clement X, The Rev William Snodgrass, James Whitcomb Riley, Carl Sandburg, Martti Talvela, Rob Collins, Hermann Prey, Gar Samuelson, Eugene Record, Laszlo Kovacs, Wilson Barrett, Florenz Ziegfeld, Duane Jones, Eric Christmas, Estelle Getty Harold Larwood, Mike Coolbaugh, Rollie Stiles, Trijntje Keever, Errico Malatesta, John Dillinger, Wayne "Marlboro Man" McLaren, Qusay Hussein, Uday Hussein,

and Illinois Jacquet.

Jive crazy, generally crazy... all the same around here.
Happy birthday, anyway.

Cranky Large Medium reading, 21 July

Go away.

What are you doing still here? Why won't you go? What is it about my presence which has you rooted to the spot? Certainly it can't be my sultry good looks and sense of style. So, why are you here, again? Oh, right. Ask the medium. You wanted a reading. And, if I give you one, you will leave, no? Glorious! Permit me. Here you are:

You are caught up in being an intellectual, and like to assume the role of leader, even though many of the projects you lead require solid instincts which you so seriously lack. You like to travel and seek adventure ; are very healthy with no understanding or tolerance of pain in others. What a jackass! You have the courage of your convictions until somebody easily points out where you are wrong.

Are you happy, now? Of course not. But, hey, at least you can think about the positive side of this... you're able to keep on thinking. These people lack that capability, as, on this date in history, they all suffered total, permanent hard drive crash: Henry Percy, Manuel II Palaeologus, Nelson Dewey, Claus von Stauffenberg, Robert Burns, Owen Wister, Marc Reisner, Arshile Gorky, Lee Miller, Ruth St. Denis, Jerry Goldsmith, Basil Rathbone, Robert Young, Steve Barton, Makoto "Mako" Iwamatsu, Bill Gleason, Charlie Paddock, Jimmie Foxx, Sam Bass, Dave Garroway, Alan Shepard,

and Long John Baldry.

One step ahead and you'll fall off the mountain.
Happy birthday, anyway.

Cranky Large Medium reading, 20 July

Go away.

Why are you still hanging around here? Isn't there something else you should be doing -- like washing your hair or scrubbing your toenails? Why aren't you gone? Oh, right, you'll be here after your reading won't you? So, if I give you yours, will you pack up and make your way out from here? Goody gumdrops! Here you are:

You are shrewd, upright, uptight and a stickler at work -- a real primadonna. You are outspoken, but can occasionally be careful in your words. Too bad that happens so seldom when it really counts. You are a regular social butterfly. Somebody will squash you like the insect you are.

Are you happy, now? Of course not. But at least you have one thing above and beyond what these people have, as, on this date in history, they all moved to Adios Park: Emperor Toba, Bernhard Riemann, Andrey Markov, Guglielmo Marconi, Pope Boniface VII, Peter Lombard, Pope Leo XIII, Jean Ingelow, William Cosmo Monkhouse, Robert Smithson, Johann Christoph Pepusch, Lew Fields, Richard Egan, James Doohan, Kayo Hatta, Mildred Harris, Sandra Gould, Bruce Lee, June Byers, Peregrine White, Francisco "Pancho" Villa, Felix Edmundovich Dzerzhinskiy, Frank Reynolds, Herbert Jenkins, Vincent Foster Jr., Tammy Faye Messner (Bakker),

and Roy Hamilton.

Here comes the exit.
Happy birthday, anyway.

Cranky Large Medium reading, 19 July

Go away.

Why are you here? Don't you have a bridge somewhere to jump off? Go on, now, skedaddle. Why won't you go? What is it about my mountain that keeps you on top of it? Oh, right, you came here for something in particular, and that was... heh, a medium should be able to grass this one easily. Let me see, now... of course, you came for what's inside my head. Well, let me pour it out, so you'll be gone. Here you are:

You have a vivid imagination, not especially practical in most circumstances. Along with that, though, you have boundless energy and ruthless ambition. With all of that, you can't figure out why people don't like you very much. That's why it's good that you like to travel, to get away.

Are you happy, now? Of course not. But then, with your imagination, you should be able to find the positive side to this -- that is, you're still alive to complain about it. That puts you far ahead of these people, all of whom, on this date in history, became figments themselves: Uda, Louise of Mecklenburg-Strelitz, Soji Okita, Zenko Suzuki, Pierre Louis Dulong, Pope Symmachus, Cesare Cremonini, Abraham H. Cannon, Bill Bright, Reverend Francis Marzen, Petrarch, William Somervile, Margaret Fuller, Rose Hartwick Thorpe, Edward Bunker, Alan Lomax, Joe Flynn, John Harvey, Eddie Quillan, Jack Warden, Elmer Valo, Lady Mary Boleyn, Sarah Good, Susannah Martin, Yekaterina Budanova,

and Lefty Frizzell.

Now you're up here on the mountain and...where's your daughter's beau?
Happy birthday, anyway.

Cranky Large Medium reading, 18 July

Go away.

Why are you still here? Why won't you go? Why do you torment me so? Why is the sky blue, the grass green? Is there something I can do to make these questions go away? Oh, right, I can give you a reading, and all will become right with the world, and then you will leave. Isn't that so? Goody gum drops. Here you go:

You are, like a cat, obsessively fastidious. In fact, you are quite the dandy, a complete fop. You do study art and fashion as though your life depended upon that. It probably does. Your temper is quick. That's about the only part of your mind which is.

Are you happy, now? Of course not. But that doesn't matter. At least by the end of this sentence your little temper tantrum will be over, and you'll be able to look at the bright side of things, as in, you're alive. That beats what these people have, as, on this date in history, they all checked their matter at the door: John Paul Jones, Robert Gould Shaw, Benito Juárez, William Westmoreland, Kenji Miyamoto, Ferdinand von Hochstetter, Karl Menninger, Eugene Merle Shoemaker, Victor Emery, Muhammad bin Qasim, Godfrey of Bouillon, Johann Heinrich Heidegger, Jane Austen, Horatio Alger, Jr., Benjamin C. Truman, Julian Bell, Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio, Antoine Watteau, Vítězslav Novák, Jerry Hadley, Jack Earle, Jack Hawkins, Rebecca Schaeffer, Donnie Moore, Bill Hicke, Machine Gun Kelly, Mary Jo Kopechne,

and Bobby Fuller.

I fought gravity. Gravity won. Good night.
Happy birthday, anyway.

Cranky Large Medium reading, 17 July

Go away.

What are you doing still standing there? Isn't the bus waiting for you? Well, go on, get to it! It will leave without you, and then you'll have to sleep out on the side of the hill, because... well, let's face it, I'm not sharing my cave with you, no matter how hard you beg. So, go on. And still you're here. What will it take for me to be rid of you? Oh, right, you want a reading. And then you'll happily leave? Boy howdy, that's a bargain! Here you are:

You are a regular MacGyver, aren't you? Even so, you spend far too much time decorating your home, so people will eventually talk.... Oh, and you're a past master at talk -- your conversational skills impress the State Department. By your kindly manner, you will irritate most of us who will eventually realize that, deep down, you're lacking in confidence just like the rest of us, but you're better at hiding it than most.

Are you happy, now? Of course not. You're quaking in your boots at the prospect of being found out. Still, you have things so much better than these people, all of whom, on this date, were taken to Boot Hill: Hosokawa Takakuni, Charles Grey, 2nd Earl Grey, Dorothea Dix, Nicholas II, Adam Smith, John Roebuck, Henri Poincaré, William James Sidis, Boris Delaunay, Magnus Felix Ennodius, Georg Fabricius, Katharine Graham, Mickey Spillane, Maurycy Gottlieb, Sinan, John Coltrane, Chas Chandler, Yujiro Ishihara, Pat Roach, Geraldine Fitzgerald, Ty Cobb, Dizzy Dean, Pierre-Charles Le Sueur, Robert Bolling, Charlotte Corday, Jim Bridger, Alexandra Fyodorovna,

and Eleanora Fagan aka Billie Holiday.

My tea is a-brewin, so you'd best go.
Happy birthday, anyway.

Cranky Large Medium reading, 16 July

Go away.

Why are you still here? Don't you have somewhere better to be, something responsible to do, someone less... me to bother? Go on, now. You can skip off this mountainside easily, right? Let me see the back of you. I'm pretty sure the back of you lacks that great honkin' schnozz. Turn it around, now.... why aren't you gone? You came here for something. Right. I didn't see that coming, did I, now? And the something would be... a reading. Quel shocka! Well, if that's what it takes to make you go, I can get behind it. Here you are:

Dang, you are stubborn! Your very definite and exceedingly narrow ideas of right and wrong are emphatic and you cannot tolerate the slightest deviation from them in others. In your passion for correctness, you wind up little more than a sanctimonious bully.

Are you happy, now? Of course not. But then, with your back as rigid as it is, I can't imagine you would be happy under any circumstances. Hey, at least you can say I pointed out the one advantage you have in this life -- that would be this life. It's way more than these people have, as each and every one of them, on this date in history, got patted on the back by the grim reaper: Emperor Go-Uda, Raoul Wallenberg*, Ilya Mechnikov, Julian Schwinger, John Cocke, Anne Askew, John Pearson, Ellen White, Ned Buntline, Hilaire Belloc, John P. Marquand, Heinrich Böll, May Sarton, Giuseppe Maria Crespi, Francis Cotes, Robert Motherwell, Johann David Heinichen, Alfred Deller, Wayne King, Herbert von Karajan, John Panozzo, Jo Stafford, Buck Buchanan, Anne of Cleves, Thomas "Tad" Lincoln, Mary Todd Lincoln, John F. Kennedy, Jr., Carolyn Bessette Kennedy,

and Harry Chapin.

Now you can start down the hill... preferably without bananas.
Happy birthday, anyway.

*date and year disputed, but viewed as "official" by government of USSR.

Cranky Large Medium reading, 15 July

Go away.

Please, won't you leave? I'm practically begging you. What will it take to make you go? Money? I have none. Power? I have none. Charm? I have none. Sex? Trust me. You don't want to go there. So, how can I persuade you to take to the highway? You'll go if I give you a reading? What a novel approach. I think I can arrange that. In fact, get packed -- here you are:

Inclined towards fretting and worrying, you mean well but irritate. If you could stop gnawing your fingernails, you might actually find are actually fond of fun. You have an active imagination, an offshoot of which is your perception that you are psychic. Just because you can predict elections in Chicago does not mean you can actually see the future. That's just politics.

Are you happy now? Of course not. But you ought to be. After all, you're well ahead of these people, all of whom, on this date, were taken to a place where politics can't reach them (unless they're from Chicago, in which case they will forever after vote Democrat): Rudolph I of Germany, Ulrich von Jungingen, Shimazu Takahisa, John J. Pershing, Hermann Emil Fischer, Bonaventure, John Ball, Michael Bruce, Anton Chekhov, Annibale Carracci, Girolamo Rainaldi, Charles-André van Loo, Jean Antoine Houdon, Jacques Duphly, Carl Czerny, Freddie Keppard, Walter Donaldson, Bert Convy, David Brian, Margaret Lockwood, Dana Hill, Billy Haughton, Tex Schramm, Juan Ponce de León, James Scott, 1st Duke of Monmouth, Robert Pershing Wadlow, Julia Lennon, Gianni Versace, Robert H. Brooks,

and Lawrence Tibbett.

Now. You. On the road to anywhere.
Happy birthday, anyway.

Cranky Large Medium reading, 14 July

Go away.

Why won't you leave? Is your proximity to me so necessary in your life? Tell me I am your life, your love, your world... you're in need of psychiatric assistance. Oh, you're not here for my love, just my answers. You want a reading. As if I couldn't have gathered that from the way you stood there gaping. Well, if that's all it will take to get you to leave me alone again, what am I waiting for? Here you are:

With your rigidity and stuffiness, you cannot tolerate or understand anything different in others. You are so wrapped up in your fantasies that you would probably perish miserably if one of your ideals were shattered. In order to be happy, you must have the full understanding of your mate. Sadly, full understanding is what would drive a mate away.

Are you happy, now? Of course not. You, with the corn cob in the inconvenient location, can not see the good in my words. Look on it this way, though -- at least you're able to be disappointed. That's a lot better than these people have it, as, on this date in history, they all turned erasing mathematicians, and began to dis-integrate: Edmond Charles Genêt, Adlai Stevenson, Carl Spaatz, Augustin-Jean Fresnel, William Henry Perkin, Richard Taverner, Camillus de Lellis, August Neander, Claude Fleury, Richard Bentley, Anne Louise Germaine de Staël, Jacinto Benavente, František Maxmilián Kaňka, Thomas Hazlehurst, Alphonse Mucha, Julie Manet, Jackie Saunders, Meredith MacRae, Pancho Villa, Bernard-René de Launay, Henry McCarty a.k.a. William H. Bonney a.k.a. Billy the Kid, Quentin Roosevelt, Frank Bell, Richard McDonald,

and Joe Harnell.

Please, don't make me angry. You wouldn't like me when I'm angry.
Happy birthday, anyway.