I was in the final throes of an article entitled, "Unlucky in Love," making a reference to one of my favorite researchers, Helen Fisher, a biological anthropologist. She has the most grounded things to say about why humans have such a hard time being monogamous, and I wanted to catch up on her latest work. In one of the articles was a link to chemistry.com so I went there. It was a personality test, sponsored by her. Pretty cool, I thought. I filled out the cover information and proceeded with the questionnaire, excited to see what insights I could glean. Turns out I was pegged as an, "Explorer/Negotiator." Made sense, my wanderlust crossed with my Libra "the balance Queen" sun. The personalized description hit just about right! ~~

You are a highly spontaneous person who always likes to try new things. Novel and unpredictable situations don't bother you; instead you find them challenging and exciting.

You tend to be focused and resourceful and you are able to juggle a lot of projects at the same time; as a result you are sometimes a whirlwind of activity.

You have a firm grip on reality and enjoy living in the present tense. But you have a keen imagination that enables you to lift off from time and space to be remarkably creative.

You are humorous. You are able to laugh at yourself, and you like entertaining others.

You have a deep sense of compassion. You can show genuine insight into the needs of others; you are good at listening and talking; and you express a genuine desire to be helpful.

Your tolerance for others and their beliefs, your lack of prejudice, your ability to compromise and your occasional antics make you popular with others and a great companion.

So far so good. Then suddenly a screen appeared that said, "Christina, Michael has noticed you! John wants to connect with you!  Christina, Meet Shane and see if there is real chemistry!" Yep, I was in the middle of chemistry.com matching service. An online date market sponsored by my heroine.

Remember my write-up about August 2nd? Well, that's the day this happened. As my awning blew over the top of La Perla and I received a book rejection from my favorite agent in NYC this came slapping through the ether.

"You have five people waiting for you!"
"Daniel is also interested in you!"

Didn't I just swear off men, at least for a week?
It was Dan's persistent attention, after all, that had just hooked my ego.

But this was Helen Fisher. I was curious. I signed up for a month, the shortest option of time.

Four days in, I gotta say it's fascinating. I'm watching. Studying. But I'm not going for it. It's Merc in retrograde. The perfect time to slow down, take a step back and study my SELF as communications run amok. This retrograde period has been described as the "Mercury-trickster with a bag full of mushrooms." It's a good time to untie knots.

I'm going to hit up more agents and more publishers for my book. On Tuesday I'm meeting two friends who are driving to Kaslo: one I met last winter in Kino Bay, Mexico (now in Ketchum, ID), the other I met last week at the Kaslo Jazz Festival. She's from Bonner's Ferry and it turns out the two are good friends! How did THAT happen?

So far the most I can say about chemistry.com is what's with all the facial hair? And, men's ability to judge their body type (most say, "normal") is about as accurate as their proverbial measurement of inches.