Happy Chinese New Year

happy-new-yearHappy Chinese New Year!  With that in mind, here is a reissue of WD Fyfe’s Fractured 12 Years of the Chinese Calendar.  Enjoy!

Rat -1948, 1960, 1972, 1984, 1996, 2008
You are a cunning and devious little bastard who’s constantly plotting against your friends.  Most people don’t like you, and even people who don’t know you think you’re an asshole.

Ox – 1949, 1961, 1973, 1985, 1997, 2009
You are incredibly stupid and everybody takes advantage of you.  You’re going to end up with a shit job and no social life because you’re so boring nobody wants to be around you.

Tiger -1950, 1962, 1974, 1986, 1998, 2010
What a bully!  You think you’re tough, but all you really are is sneaky.  Why don’t you pick on somebody your own size, ya loser?

Rabbit -1951, 1963, 1975, 1987, 1999, 2011
You are promiscuous to a fault, without the smarts to be a whore.  You think you’re cute, but you’re just a pumped up little weasel who’ll screw anything with a pulse.

Dragon -1952, 1964, 1976, 1988, 2000, 2012
You’re a total egomania, but most people don’t even know you exist.  The ones who do think you’re a blowhard and avoid you whenever possible.  You’ll probably end up dead in a ditch somewhere.

Snake -1953, 1965, 1977, 1989, 2001, 2013
You’re a smarmy, two-faced liar who would sell your own grandmother if you thought there was any profit in it.  People throw stones at you and chase you with sticks.

Horse -1954, 1966, 1978, 1990, 2002, 2014
You’re a petty little masochist who loves having your ass whipped.  You’re always getting scammed into doing all the work and letting others take the credit for it.  You think this is noble, but it’s just pathetic.

Sheep -1955, 1967, 1979, 1991, 2003, 2015
You’re such a complete pussy even little kids push you around.  You have no ambition in life and spend all your time hanging out with other people just as useless as you are.  Your idea of a good time is a haircut.

Monkey – 1956, 1968, 1980, 1992, 2004, 2016
You are a yappy waste of space who’s fascinated by your own feces.  You think people like you, but they’re actually laughing at you behind your back.  You look ridiculous half the time.

Rooster – 1957, 1969, 1981, 1993, 2005, 2017
You’re an arrogant know-it-all, strutting around, giving everybody the benefit of your opinion.  Actually, you’ve never said anything of value and just keep repeating yourself — over and over and over.  Even your friends want to choke the life out of you.

Dog -1958, 1970, 1982, 1994, 2006, 2018
You are the world’s biggest suck.  It’s truly embarrassing to watch just how much ass-kissing you’re capable of.

Pig – 1959, 1971, 1983, 1995, 2007, 2019
You’re forever reminding people how smart you are to cover up your disgusting behaviour and atrocious table manners.  Nobody (and I mean NOBODY) wants to sleep with you — ever.  For God sake, you smell like a sewer!

Gong Hey Fat Choy

 

The Year of the Monkey

new yearPersonally, I don’t believe in astrological hocus-pocus.  As the man said, “The fault, … is not in our stars,/But in ourselves, … .”  However, I do love the concept.

Yesterday was the beginning of Chinese New Year (a seven day celebration.) Chinese New Year is calculated as the second new moon after the Winter Solstice, and that’s why it moves around on the Gregorian (European) calendar.  Anyway, we are now in the Year of the Monkey — to be more precise, the year of the Fire Monkey.  Chinese astrology actually includes five “Earthly Elements” (Wood, Fire, Earth, Metal and Water) as well as the 12 yearly ones, so it’s really based on 60 not 12.  (There’s a Yin and Yang thrown in there too, but I’m not sure how that works.)  People born in the Year of the Monkey have certain unique and admirable traits and abilities.  It’s all very complicated, but the bottom line is ancient Chinese scholars were trying to explain human existence by looking for patterns in time.

Humans love patterns, repetition, symmetry — it’s in our DNA — and we’re obsessed with “What the hell are we doing here?”  So, it’s only natural that, when our ancestors starting seeing patterns in time, they saw parallels to the things around them.  The Sun, the Moon, the stars and the seasons seem to govern the instinctive behaviour of every other species on the planet (birds fly south, bears hibernate etc,) so why not apply them to people?  To them, it made perfect sense that if the leaves fall from the trees every time Orion is in one particular part of the sky, that should have some effect on humans, as well.  Nice try!  The fundamental mistake our stupid ancestors made was connecting the dots that didn’t exist.  The rhythms of our planet are all part of one infinitely complicated system which is governed by — uh — for want of a better term — God only knows.  The Sun, the Moon, the stars and the seasons are just one part of it — they don’t run the show.

Having said all that, I was once told:

The Wood Horse has a good and satisfying nature. They can communicate well with others and are able to talk intelligently on many different subjects. They are hard and thorough workers, and are held in very high esteem by their friends and work colleagues.

People often seek the Wood Horses’ ideas because of their very imaginative nature; they can come up with some very original and practical ideas. Wood Horses can be very generous people and often enjoy helping others out, when possible.

The Wood Horse is an extremely lovely person and usually has a massive number of friends and admirers. They love to meet new people and will always be at a party or large social gathering, as they love being the centre of attention.

Yeah, that sounds about right.