Aspects for the week beginning 27 November 2022

Finding Solutions

A Guest Blog by Janet Leng

On Sunday 13th November I had a sudden brainwave and by the end of the day was starting to put plans in action with a meeting arranged for first thing Tuesday morning. During the course of the meeting my brainwave turned into an up and running partnership, taking off at the speed of light. Being heavily involved in these  plans I hadn’t looked at Lana’s blog (as it would probably be about Strictly and I wouldn’t have a clue as to who all the people were anyway ) so it was a couple of days later when I was telling her about my news that she jumped on the fact that it fitted perfectly with Tuesday’s aspects and asked if I would write about it in an upcoming blog. I had a quick look at the aspects for Tuesday 15th November and immediately saw exactly what she meant with the quick succession of Mercury sextile Pluto, Sun trine Neptune and Venus trine Jupiter through the morning.  So here I am.

I’ll start at the beginning. A year ago, I began volunteer work with an anti-waste organisation called Olio. I work three days a week, often more, on Olio contracts with the big store chains to collect surplus food and distribute it via an app to save it from being chucked in a skip and thrown away. During this year I have given away many thousands of food items in my neighbourhood.

In the beginning we often received ridiculously huge bread surplus which resulted in driving miles to community larders to pass on our own surplus stock. When Russia invaded Ukraine it struck me that wheat production and our imports would be seriously impacted and, to me, that meant this current overproduction was a real problem. I wracked my brains in an effort to find industrial size freezer space we could “borrow” for use to store bread in the community but got nowhere fast.

Moving on to Saturday 12th November I read a lengthy piece about the dire financial situation in schools whose dwindling budgets, already hit by spiralling costs, were having to feed pupils coming to school having had no breakfast and bringing no lunch with them either. Some schools were having to choose between feeding kids or paying a teaching assistant. I was shocked to learn that to qualify for free school dinners a family income had to fall below £9000 per year. How would a family manage on £10,000? I asked myself.

And that’s how I came to have a brainwave the next day. Why had I never thought of it before?

I remembered my son’s best friend (a school vice principal responsible for child safe guarding and wellbeing at a local academy school)  telling me how during the pandemic the teachers were taking out food parcels to families and that they were now continuing due to the cost of living crisis hitting some of their students living in areas of high deprivation. I asked him if they were doing breakfast clubs- they are – and by Sunday night he’d put me in touch with a lovely teacher whose remit is links with the community to ask if I could help with a supply of food. He immediately suggested we set up a partnership and arranged a meeting for Tuesday morning.

Within minutes we’d worked out a framework and I was introduced to the school chef and her deputy who are putting in extra hours providing a free breakfast for any child. I’d brought a few bits and pieces with me to get them started and then I was off home to collect more and I’ve been filling up their freezers since then. It’s a win-win-win and I’ve also succeeded in achieving my aim in reducing food miles and keeping everything in the local community.

A number of other volunteers like me have come on board and are letting me know when suitable items appear in their collections. I then have a team of local mums who have signed up to the app and will request the items for the school through the app so everything is correctly accounted for to Olio and to the big stores. And I run around collecting the food and taking to the school.  Volunteers who collect from Bookers the Wholesalers are on the case collecting items suitable for the fortnightly food hampers for me so we’ve gone way beyond the initial question of “What can I do with all this spare bread?”

The high point was Wednesday 16th when I picked up 42 packs of muffins, both blueberry and chocolate , and I was able to take in one for every child at breakfast club the next day.

Within the fortnight breakfast club has received supplies of milk, spread, ham and cheese for toasties, pepperoni and mozzarella slices to go on mini pizzas made from Milk Roll bread, sausage rolls, bagels, English muffins and endless types of bread. Towards the Fridays hampers we donated tins of spaghetti hoops, wraps, bake at home baguettes, sliced focaccia, sourdough rolls, tins of tomatoes, caramel filled crepes. And more bread!

So everyone is happy and the managers at my stores love it. I’ve told Lana that the inside of my head feels like a telephone exchange with all the coordination needed.  Funnily enough I didn’t spot anything relating to that in her aspects for the week but  I suspect that Mercury has a hand in it somewhere!

Aspects 

Janet is retired and lives in York.  She is doing sterling work, and it is to be hoped that these sort of initiatives spread and alleviate some of the problems in our society at the moment.  It is a shame that such people are having to remedy the shortfall of our governments.  But it’s an illustration of how work on the ground can bring hope.  The aspects for the week beginning 13th November were exceptionally helpful, a rare tidal wave of good vibes, and I had the expectation that they would together help to bring about useful shifts.

So, on to the prospects for this week: Tomorrow (Monday 28th), Mars trines Saturn.  This constructive trine may seem unexciting, but it does mean that hard work can pay off.  Think through what you want to achieve, and set about steadily allowing it to unfold, with some concrete or physical input or ignition on your part.  A trine not to be sniffed at.

On Tuesday (29th) Mercury opposes Mars, which could cause you may make minor slip ups because you will feel like going quickly and pushing through agendas fast.  Heated debates, irritability and incident-proneness could also be a feature of Mercury opposite Mars.  As Janet put it: “the inside of my head feels like a telephone exchange with all the coordination needed.”  Geminis particularly need to take note.

On Wednesday (30th) there is another pedestrian but progressive aspect, in the shape of Mercury sextile Saturn.  Thoughts and feelings can be channelled and harnessed into constructive plans and ideas.  Mental foundations can be laid.  The aspect favours documentation and knuckling down to form-filling etc.  If Geminis and Virgos were a little discombobulated on Tuesday, they have the chance to regain their balance.

There’s another opposition on Thursday (1st December), that between Venus and Mars, so there may be tension between the sexes, or a tussle between your own inner male and female.  Both may be wanting different things: Venus, from Sagittarius wants to spread the love, and Mars from Gemini wants to focus energy.  The battle for the remote control may centre around TV soap operas vs the World Cup.  Who is being the selfish one?  Is there a win win position?

Aspects are concentrated into the early hours of Friday (2nd), starting with a square between Mercury and Neptune.  This may disrupt sleep patterns, so you may have a wakeful period in the night, trying to sort your thoughts.  Some undefinable snag may be nagging at you.  If so, allow your subconscious to bring it up in its own time, but don’t shut up shop until you have identified the rum note.  Then you can deal with it, move on and let it go.  There could be some scandals in the news.

Shortly after, but still in the early hours, Venus sextiles Saturn.  Relationships need consideration, and will repay the time and loyalty you give them.  It is a helpful aspect for laying the foundations of artistic or musical work.  During the course of the day, the two aspects may make themselves known, so you may have mixed results and for different activities, but some of the day will be smooth sailing.

The week in bullet points:

• Tomorrow – constructive
• Tuesday – fractious
• Wednesday – constructive
• Thursday – split desires
• Friday – confusion; loyalty; mixed fortunes