The idea of summing and then numerologically reducing the values of the cards in a spread to arrive at a single Major Arcanum card as a high-level summary of the individual details serves as a kind of "capstone" on the narrative. This practice seems to have entered the modern tarot world via the books of … Continue reading The Quintessence, Sub-quintessence and Grand Quintessence
The Salmon of Doubt Uncertain Future Spread
Sometimes tarot spread creation can be just plain fun! Satirical writer Douglas Adams (The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy) had a very British way with words that (along with Monty Python) has inspired many of my quirkier spread titles. Before he passed, he was working on a new novel called The Salmon of Doubt, which … Continue reading The Salmon of Doubt Uncertain Future Spread
An Unlikely Prediction
On February 2, 2017 I performed a predictive tarot reading on the outcome of Super Bowl 51 (aka “Super Bowl LI”). For many in the country, the New England Patriots were the “black hat” contender because of the “Deflategate” scandal, even though the football pundits considered them a convincing favorite to win. One of the … Continue reading An Unlikely Prediction
And Now for Something Completely Different
I warned you some of my other passions would creep in here. Below is my recipe for an Ultimate Irish Peach Sour. While traveling back from Florida last May, we stopped at an Applebees in western Virginia. They had a new mixed drink on the menu called an "Irish Peach Sour." I put my whisky-savvy … Continue reading And Now for Something Completely Different
Thoth Court Cards “By the Book”
A while back, as a service to the on-line Thoth community, I went through every paragraph of the Court Card section of the Book of Thoth, trawling Crowley's "moral characteristics" for words and phrases that could be compiled into a robust keyword list derived from his own words. After tabulating that, I created a second, … Continue reading Thoth Court Cards “By the Book”
“Cheap Shots” #2: Intuit This!
"I don't need no steenkin' books! My intuition sees all." (Alternatively, "I talk to angels.") Frankly, as a story-teller, if all I gave my Muse to work with was my presumptive groping after what I vaguely supposed the people in the cards might be up to within the context of the reading, she would run … Continue reading “Cheap Shots” #2: Intuit This!
The “Train to Nowhere” Missing Person Spread
I created this spread as a result of on-line discussions about "cold case" missing person investigations. The one and only time I've used it so far, a young lady in California turned up in Car #8, the Dead Letter Office. She was in fact discovered drowned in a local river. Not the kind of validation … Continue reading The “Train to Nowhere” Missing Person Spread
Fortitude and the TdM Master Layout
Before anyone flees for the exit, this 78-card extravaganza is NOT a spread for divination, it's a systematic way to assign interpretive meaning to the suit cards of the Tarot de Marseille (TdM) by “borrowing” it from the “trump” cards of the same number (up to a point). Finding meaning in the numbered small (or … Continue reading Fortitude and the TdM Master Layout
The Crosstown Traffic Series
Here is something that will be of absolutely no practical use to anybody except those of us who think deep, convoluted thoughts about tarot as a "system" (and maybe not even then). It falls off the far edge of theoretical thinking even for me, but I do like the visuals. (And I always did admire … Continue reading The Crosstown Traffic Series
Trump Cards for Timing
In the temporal scheme of all things tarot, the card suits and numbers work reasonably well together to create a model for estimating the timing of future events. Although it is deeply flawed (for example, no reply to a job application is likely to take "years;" the more practical answer is probably "never"), the rule-of-thumb … Continue reading Trump Cards for Timing
