Mercury retrogrades from 9° 4′ Scorpio to 23° 23′ Libra from 11 October to 1 November 2007. The back-end shadow period lasts from 22 September to 10 October and the front-end shadow period from 2 November to 17 November 2007.

I am discounting the usual glitches and disruptions to do with missed appointments, computer trouble and travel delays. This is a list of events that stood out.


Back-end shadow period, 22 September to 10 October 2007:

  • Car battery goes flat (again!!), forgot to turn off the lights
  • Joined Facebook, and am hooked; found many friends in cyberspace I haven’t seen or spoken to in a long time (Mercury is going to retrograde in my 11th house of friends and social networks after all!).
  • Ex-boyfriend turns up on Instant Messenger (and we are not in touch that often) suddenly wanting some cyber-nookie, and I am thinking ‘Mercury rx in Scorpio surely cannot be that literal!’

Retrograde period, 11 October to 1 November 2007:

  • I am still applying for fellowships and jobs, and the postal strike makes it a farce: I send out two applications by expensive courier, and then find that the organisation decided to allow email submissions! (the Royal Mail and the union reach a deal though)
  • Joke: a week after the fiasco of sending out the application cited above, I receive an email from the funding body saying the host institution (which was chasing me to get it right) hadn’t filled in their bit
  • Delayed thesis examiners’ report comes in with a very tight turnaround time for submission, and a whole rigmarole of hassle too tedious to describe here

Front-end shadow period, 2 November to 17 November 2007:

  • Thesis submission hassle gets sorted with much less pain than expected
  • Curiously unexpected falling out with friends without really being able to locate the real cause; plenty of time for discovery yet

Not to bad a personal retrograde period, I have to say, beyond the exhaustion of wider events. Mercury retrograded largely in my 11th house of social activity and friendships, and as I’ve mentioned, many friends from the past have popped up through Facebook.

Because I’m waiting for news on job applications and the like, I feel like I’m in a waiting room. Nonetheless the retrograde has given me the opportunity to go over some projects and put others to bed once and for all. Bring on the next one.