COS Chapter Eight: "The Deathday Party"

[for-diddled.livejournal.com]

* Everyone’s got such a hate-on for Percy that he’s described using negative imagery even when he’s doing something nice. Here he’s “bullying” Ginny into taking some potion for her cold.

* Knowing what will happen in GOF, everybody’s probably going to blame him for thinking that Ginny’s a little bit ill, rather than realising that she was just being possessed by a Horcrux-ified diary which once belonged to a dark wizard who’s been dead for eleven years. Christ, Percy, are you blind or something?

* Although in retrospect it’s obvious that Ginny’s just too awesome to suffer from such petty ailments as the common cold, so maybe he should have noticed.

* Oh no wait, she hasn’t yet become MarySue!Ginny, so she might still suffer illness like the rest of us mere mortals.

* Obviously Harry’s going to be drenched to the skin, but why’s he splattered with mud? The whole point of Quidditch is that they players fly a long way above the ground, so they wouldn’t have much opportunity to get muddy. Unless Harry fell off a lot… Wait, did I just implicitly diss Harry’s SuperQuidditch!Skillz? Ignore that.

* In the last chapter, everybody acted as if Slytherin spying on Gryffindor’s try-outs was a dirty, underhanded thing to do. Fred and George have been spying on Slytherin. Slytherin, as far as we know, never actually spied on Gryffindor (or, indeed, anyone). IOIAGDI, obviously.

* I highly doubt that the Nimbus 2001 is so good as to make all other brooms obsolete.

* Nearly-headless Nick died in 1492, but the clothes he’s wearing seem more Elizabethan in style, i.e., about a century later. Perhaps there’s a ghost clothes shop where spirits can keep up-to-date with the latest fashions, but NHN just likes Elizabethan fashions so much that he stopped going after around 1600.

* Of course, this sort of fanwank wouldn’t be necessary if JKR had actually bothered to think about her setting, and either gave Nick more period-appropriate clothing or made this his four hundredth deathday instead.

* If the purpose of the Headless Hunt is to play ball games with members’ own heads, excluding members who aren’t fully decapitated seems quite reasonable to me.

* Once again, JKR, trying to enforce rules ≠ “endless battle against students”.

* Filch has been cleaning all morning when any of the teachers (and probably quite a few of the pupils) could have done it in an instant with a quick “Scourgify!” No wonder he’s in a bad mood, really.

* Although I do wonder why Dumbledore hired him as caretaker. Perhaps he just enjoys watching him being humiliated.

* So what is this mysterious power that connects Filch and Mrs. Norris? Does the fact that Filch is a Squib rule out magic, or does being a Squib just mean that he can’t do wand magic, but can still be magically connected to his pets?

* Is it wrong that I’ve always totally rooted for Filch against Fred and George?

* By making Filch’s eagerness to hang pupils by their ankles “common knowledge”, i.e., unsubstantiated rumour, Rowling handily manages to turn us against him whilst avoiding having to provide any evidence to back this up.

* I can’t help but wonder why Dumbles keeps Peeves around. Possibly it’s so that he can handily distract Filch when Our Hero is in trouble. Or maybe blackmail’s involved. “Don’t forget, Twinkles, I’ve got your old love-letters from Gellert Grindlewald. So if you even think about getting rid of me…”

* Harry apparently has no qualms about looking through other people’s correspondence. Our hero, ladies and gentlemen!

* One of these days I’m going to write a fic where Harry suffers karmic revenge for being such a jerk. So his schooldays will be made a misery by people reading his private letters, hexing rude words across his face, beating him at Quidditch by buying superior brooms which make every match a foregone conclusion…

* Nice to see that wizards have picked up on the irritating Muggle habit of deliberately misspelling words in their brand names.

* Any guesses on how exactly a warlock differs from a regular wizard?

* Harry put the envelope down two feet away from where it was. D’oh!

* Filch is obviously ashamed of being a Squib, suggesting that they suffer from prejudice from fellow wizards, unlike Muggleborns. “Mudblood” is still a worse insult than “Sneakin’ Squib,” though.

* NHN is prepared to destroy a priceless antique in order to get Harry out of detention. Good to see he’s got his priorities straight.

* NHN seems like a bit of a joke, to be honest. About the only time we see him interacting with Gryffindor students is when they needle him at the feast; the rest of the time, they just seem to ignore him.

* I bet the Slytherins treat their ghost better. They probably hold a big party in their common room every time it’s the Bloody Baron’s deathday, with music, dancing, and various wizarding party games. The highlight of the night is a play (written by and starring Draco Malfoy, of course) about the Baron’s death. It’s absolutely excellent. :)

* Off on a bit of a tangent here, but isn’t the Baron supposed to have been contemporaneous with the Hogwarts Founders? Which would mean that he lived sometime during the Anglo-Saxon period, which would mean that he couldn’t be a baron, as the rank was introduced by the Normans, who didn’t control England until 1066…

* F&G are feeding a firework to a salamander, continuing the long tradition of cruelty to animals in the series.

* “‘A promise is a promise,’ Hermione reminded Harry bossily.” Because only bossy kill-joys care about such things as keeping your promises. Most normal people are fine with the idea of just breaking them whenever you feel like it.

* Apparently when their bodies died, the ghosts’ musical taste died too.

* Rather careless (some might say rude) of Nick to invite three living people along and then not bother to provide them with any food.

* Rotting food might have a stronger flavour than normal food. Unfortunately, it’s also a not very nice flavour.

* So, the good guys can’t stand Myrtle and make fun of her behind her back; the evil Slytherin Draco Malfoy, OTOH, is able to get past her unpleasant exterior and make friends with her. I’ll just chalk that up as #147 on the “Instances when the bad guys actually seem better than the good guys” board.

* Rather rude of Sir Patrick to interrupt Nick’s speech like that. Makes you wonder why exactly Nick invited him.

* Or why he’s so keen to join the Hunt, for that matter.

* “Time to kill… I smell blood… I SMELL BLOOD”? Do basilisks always speak in such a melodramatic way, or is it just putting it on to amuse Harry? Or did it just pick up the Slytherin theatrical habit from Salazar or Tom?

* Given that all the students are coming up from the same place, why exactly are they coming in from different ends of the corridor?

* I know that people often think of Draco as a bit of a drama queen, but pushing to the front of the crowds and shouting “You’ll be next, Mudbloods!” seems ridiculously over-the-top (not to mention rather stupid), even for him. I literally cannot imagine what his motivation for doing this is meant to be.

* Actually, I think Olivander shows us a spell in GOF to make wine fly out of their wands. Maybe Draco’s just discovered this, and currently drunk off his arse.

* Or maybe Rowling just hooked his testicles up to car batteries and turned up the voltage until he agreed to be one of the book’s red herrings.

* Come to think of it, a lot of the plot/characterisation in the series would make a good deal more sense if we assume that that’s what happened. “Look, Sirius, I don’t care if you’re smart enough to figure a way of staying sane despite being surrounded for twelve years by an army of depression-inducing monsters, before masterminding an escape from an impregnable island fortress and evading the biggest man-hunt in recent wizarding history for almost a year, I need you to be really reckless and immature in this book so that you can get killed at the end and make Harry feel miserable. Quick, Dobby, get the car batteries!”

* Hey, maybe that could be a new acronym, for any time when someone does something inexplicable or otherwise out of character: QGCB (for “Quick, get the car batteries!”).

 

Comments

[aasaylva.livejournal.com]

It would, however, tie in with the tendency of having the evil people be of foreign origin...

[mmmarcusz.livejournal.com]

Actually there was the Old English beorn (nobleman) and the Frankish baro (freeman) before baron became a formal title. But I doubt JKR actually thought about the school being founded in the 9th/10th century - what language they spoke, what they wore, what the name means, how big the original castle was, did Muggles know about it, etc.

[oryx_leucoryx]

* Harry apparently has no qualms about looking through other people’s correspondence. Our hero, ladies and gentlemen!

Just like his mother before him. Who said Harry didn't resemble her?

[aikaterini.livejournal.com]

/* Everyone’s got such a hate-on for Percy that he’s described using negative imagery even when he’s doing something nice. Here he’s “bullying” Ginny into taking some potion for her cold./

Maybe Percy had the wrong idea and wrong attitude, but at least he recognized that something was wrong with Ginny. Nobody else in her family seemed to realize that she was unwell, not even Ron.

/“Don’t forget, Twinkles, I’ve got your old love-letters from Gellert Grindlewald. So if you even think about getting rid of me…”/

XD I wonder if the Nurmengard guards did something similar to Gellert with Albus's letters.

/* So, the good guys can’t stand Myrtle and make fun of her behind her back; the evil Slytherin Draco Malfoy, OTOH, is able to get past her unpleasant exterior and make friends with her./

Yes, but I'm heard some fans say that their friendship was all in Myrtle's head and that Draco didn't really like her; he was just overwrought and had nobody else to turn to, so he put up with her. :(

/* Or maybe Rowling just hooked his testicles up to car batteries and turned up the voltage until he agreed to be one of the book’s red herrings./

Well, yes, but I thought that another reason for this scene was to show us yet another instance of Draco being a horrible racist, especially since people use this scene all the time to prove how awful Draco is.

/“Look, Sirius, I don’t care if you’re smart enough to figure a way of staying sane despite being surrounded for twelve years by an army of depression-inducing monsters, before masterminding an escape from an impregnable island fortress and evading the biggest man-hunt in recent wizarding history for almost a year, I need you to be really reckless and immature in this book so that you can get killed at the end and make Harry feel miserable. Quick, Dobby, get the car batteries!”/

XD Hilarious! But in all seriousness, I was really disappointed with Sirius' characterization in OotP, as well as that book's characterizations of other characters: Harry (of course), Percy, Fudge, Angelina, Cho, etc.

[for-diddled.livejournal.com]

"Well, yes, but I thought that another reason for this scene was to show us yet another instance of Draco being a horrible racist,"

I agree that that was probably the intention, but as his "racism" normally consists of insulting one girl (whom he'd almost certainly dislike anyway), this scene just seems really OOC to me.

[borg-princess.livejournal.com]

I'm heard some fans say that their friendship was all in Myrtle's head and that Draco didn't really like her; he was just overwrought and had nobody else to turn to, so he put up with her. :(

But I don't see Draco letting himself be vulnerable in front of just anyone, y'know? For him to open up and be emotional in front of her, he had to have a bit of trust at the very least, that she wouldn't tell everyone about his woes and humiliate him.

Besides- let's not throw stones about their unusual friendship, what about the trio? *snorts* Great solid foundation their 'friendship' is built on, what with the hostilities and frequent cold periods where they ignore each other for months on end unless they see an opportunity to make one another feel bad, etc. etc.

They only made friends with Hermione after she lied (for no good reason, it's not like her lie got them out of trouble, all it did was get her into trouble!), so I hardly think the tenuous-or-not bond between Draco and Myrtle can be mocked. *sniffs disdainfully*

[majorjune.livejournal.com]

* Nearly-headless Nick died in 1492, but the clothes he’s wearing seem more Elizabethan in style, i.e., about a century later. Perhaps there’s a ghost clothes shop where spirits can keep up-to-date with the latest fashions, but NHN just likes Elizabethan fashions so much that he stopped going after around 1600.

And considering just how behind-the-times wizard clothing is, one would think that a wizard's outfit circa 1492 would be reflective of an era at least a couple of hundred years earlier, say a long medieval or Byzantine-style tunic...

[condwiramurs.livejournal.com]

Pre-Seclusion wizards likely would have been wearing what their neighbors wore. Nobody in the late 1600s was wearing robes (except academics and such), so those would be a deliberate adoption as some sort of "wizard cultural dress."

[oryx_leucoryx]

* Nearly-headless Nick died in 1492, but the clothes he’s wearing seem more Elizabethan in style, i.e., about a century later. Perhaps there’s a ghost clothes shop where spirits can keep up-to-date with the latest fashions, but NHN just likes Elizabethan fashions so much that he stopped going after around 1600.

* Of course, this sort of fanwank wouldn’t be necessary if JKR had actually bothered to think about her setting, and either gave Nick more period-appropriate clothing or made this his four hundredth deathday instead.

As she originally planned. In early editions of PS he was about 400 years dead.

* So what is this mysterious power that connects Filch and Mrs. Norris? Does the fact that Filch is a Squib rule out magic, or does being a Squib just mean that he can’t do wand magic, but can still be magically connected to his pets?

And Mrs Figg, the other known canonical squib is a cat lady who sends cats on missions (see OOTP - she had one of her cats reporting o her on Mundungus).

* Is it wrong that I’ve always totally rooted for Filch against Fred and George?

You get old lady points for that.

* Any guesses on how exactly a warlock differs from a regular wizard?

swythyv made up a really fun theory about it before DH, completely based on the times the term 'warlock' is mentioned in canon (and her wild imagination). However in 'Beedle' Rowling has Dumbles defining the term as one with skill in dueling and martial magic.

The highlight of the night is a play (written by and starring Draco Malfoy, of course) about the Baron’s death. It’s absolutely excellent. :)

Is that the same version the Grey Lady tells?

* F&G are feeding a firework to a salamander, continuing the long tradition of cruelty to animals in the series.

After killing Ron's puffskein, what's torturing a salamander a bit?

* “‘A promise is a promise,’ Hermione reminded Harry bossily.” Because only bossy kill-joys care about such things as keeping your promises.

As well as deeply horrible people (with greasy hair).

[mmmarcusz.livejournal.com]

Is that the same version the Grey Lady tells?

Yes, but with more singing.

[borg-princess.livejournal.com]

After killing Ron's puffskein, what's torturing a salamander a bit?

Oh, gross, really? And these are the good guys! *eyeroll*

[borg-princess.livejournal.com]

he’s described using negative imagery even when he’s doing something nice. Here he’s “bullying” Ginny into taking some potion for her cold

I've really come to love Percy, certainly the most from that family. He's the only one that's consistently been caring and supportive of his siblings, and all he gets is contempt and put-downs in return. *squishes him*

* Obviously Harry’s going to be drenched to the skin, but why’s he splattered with mud? The whole point of Quidditch is that they players fly a long way above the ground, so they wouldn’t have much opportunity to get muddy.

Lol, good point! I really have no idea! This is where I point out, yet again, how little contradictions and inconsistencies like this reveal what a novice JKR is at world-building and maintaining internal integrity within her creation. She comes up with all these parallels for everything from our own society and history, and then doesn't work to make it believable (as with Voldy/Hitler- 'oh, I'll just use WWII as a reference for my own story so I don't have to bother fleshing it out or giving my characters real motivations') or realistic. Like, she thought of boarding school sports rivalries, it's a given within this genre, so she just put them on brooms to hit that mark- but then she wrote about 'wet, muddy players' because she forgot it wasn't lacrosse or whatever, but that they were actually way up in the air.

Does that make sense? I just mean that she has an image in her head- 'oh, I need to get this in the story because it's such a relatable vivid experience'- but doesn't think it all the way through and consider the magical implications when she's depicting it in her made-up world with her made-up rules.

IOIAGDI, obviously.

Mrowr? *ponders* Not so obvious, bb, can you define it for me? When urban dictionary fails me, I have nowhere else to go!

If the purpose of the Headless Hunt is to play ball games with members’ own heads, excluding members who aren’t fully decapitated seems quite reasonable to me.

IKR? Gryffindors. Always raeg'ing against prejudice that doesn't exist.

Filch has been cleaning all morning when any of the teachers (and probably quite a few of the pupils) could have done it in an instant with a quick “Scourgify!” No wonder he’s in a bad mood, really.

* Although I do wonder why Dumbledore hired him as caretaker. Perhaps he just enjoys watching him being humiliated.

OMG, EXACTLY. I've just gotten so angry about this so often! (like in GoF, where we hear about McGonagall 'supervising' Filch cleaning the floors, wtf. WHY NOT SCOURGIFY THE FRAKKING FLOORS INSTEAD OF MAKING AN OLD GUY IN ILL HEALTH DO IT?)

But yeah, again, here's JKR going 'hmm, need a grumpy lower-class citizen type character with a menial job, well, I know, the stereotypical janitor, that'll do!' Without thinking what use would a non-magical person be in trying to keep clean a castle with 'nine sprawling floors, six different towers, uncountable hidden rooms and passageways, and a whooping 142 staircases'. Sure, he'll be able to keep on top of that on his own, cleaning by hand. If he'd been some sort of filing clerk or whatever in a desk job, it'd be okay, but come on!

[for-diddled.livejournal.com]

"IKR? Gryffindors. Always raeg'ing against prejudice that doesn't exist."

And completely ignoring prejudice that does, as Marionros pointed out last week.

"If he'd been some sort of filing clerk or whatever in a desk job, it'd be okay, but come on!"

I think this is another example of JKR copying something from the real world without thinking it through. In reality, poorly-educated people often end up with menial jobs, so it's like that in the WW too. Never mind that being well-educated would actually make someone better suited for menial jobs.

But yeah, it does come across as quite wrong. It'd be better if Filch was the head janitor or something, and was responsible for co-ordinating the teams of House Elves who do the actual cleaning, or something like that.

[borg-princess.livejournal.com]

Is it wrong that I’ve always totally rooted for Filch against Fred and George?

I'm with you, bb. I hate it when privileged, arrogant prats keep winning over the downtrodden long-suffering characters. Unfortunately, this is the series which makes it a virtue to bully and lord it over those beneath you in station, that is, anyone in Slytherin or who likes following the rules.

(HBP makes it so much worse- it's one thing that the twins' pranks end up creating a lot of work for Filch- it's damn annoying, but I don't think we see them deliberately trying to give him hell, whereas Harry is following him around and hexing him from behind, that asshole)

“common knowledge”, i.e., unsubstantiated rumour, Rowling handily manages to turn us against him whilst avoiding having to provide any evidence to back this up.

She does that a lot. God, she's so masterful in making people hate on characters for no good reason.

Harry apparently has no qualms about looking through other people’s correspondence. Our hero, ladies and gentlemen!

>_< Um...I am always up for bashing Harry for being a brat, but...I kind of...don't recognize people's privacy if I'm in a position to read through mail, so...yes, I know, I'm an awful person! *headdesk*

Filch is obviously ashamed of being a Squib, suggesting that they suffer from prejudice from fellow wizards, unlike Muggleborns. “Mudblood” is still a worse insult than “Sneakin’ Squib,” though.

THANK YOU. I am so disgusted by the double-standard. Le's portray a group of special, privileged, generally well-liked characters as the 'victimized' group, while encouraging hatred and bullying of the chararacters who actually suffer prejudice and are discriminated against.

Harry slamming Filch for being born without magic is such an appalling moment. So our hero can look down on him for an accident of birth, which is an attitude he develops on his own, but Draco's so evil for spouting the beliefs he's been brought up with and never known he should challenge.

NHN is prepared to destroy a priceless antique in order to get Harry out of detention. Good to see he’s got his priorities straight.

The whole UNIVERSE bends over backwards to get Harry out of detention. Like Lupin in PoA. Let's not punish Harry for breaking the rules and sneaking out and oh, btw, risking his life for no good reason! Let's disrespect Snape and pull one over him and just make him angry at Harry getting away with misbehavior yet again!

The highlight of the night is a play (written by and starring Draco Malfoy, of course) about the Baron’s death. It’s absolutely excellent. :)

Lol, YES. I can totally see this happening! Drama Queen Draco FTW. :D

[for-diddled.livejournal.com]

"She does that a lot. God, she's so masterful in making people hate on characters for no good reason."

*sighs* I know. I remember it wasn't until I started reading DTCL that I realised that most of the "bad" guys were actually better people than the Trio, whereupon I felt rather silly for not realising it earlier. But yeah, ITA on this point.

"Harry slamming Filch for being born without magic is such an appalling moment."

It would've been great if Filch had ended up giving Harry some vital information to defeat Voldemort -- giving the clue that helps him work out where the Diadem is, FE -- as well as somewhat ironic, given that Voldemort looked down on non-magical people. As it is, though, it seems like non-magical people literally are worse than magical ones (cf. the PM in "The Other Minister"), which ironically makes those evil bigots, the Malfoys, right. Even the "anti-prejudice" message is more "Muggleborns are no different to other wizards, so treating them differently is wrong", implicitly reinforcing anti-Muggle prejudice (a bit like those Victorians who thought that other races were OK, provided they disowned their own culture and tried to be as British as possible), rather than "Muggles are people just like wizards, so there's no shame in being a Muggle or having Muggle blood."

[borg-princess.livejournal.com]

* “‘A promise is a promise,’ Hermione reminded Harry bossily.”

Randomly, I hate the word 'bossy'. It seems developed solely to put down females who are assertive and not meekly melting into the background as they ought in the presence of their male superiors. I mean, jeez, when is a guy ever described as bossy? Never! He's strong and confident and a million other positive adjectives, not bossy!

the good guys can’t stand Myrtle and make fun of her behind her back; the evil Slytherin Draco Malfoy, OTOH, is able to get past her unpleasant exterior and make friends with her. I’ll just chalk that up as #147 on the “Instances when the bad guys actually seem better than the good guys” board.

Aww, that's nice! Lovely observation there, I'd never thought about that.

I rather hate the way Harry coldly uses Myrtle- yes, she's annoying, but she's sad and lonely, and she basically helps save his life by giving him info in GoF, but he just crosses his fingers when he promises to visit her. Some gratitude. That little shit. >:[

pushing to the front of the crowds and shouting “You’ll be next, Mudbloods!” seems ridiculously over-the-top (not to mention rather stupid), even for him. I literally cannot imagine what his motivation for doing this is meant to be.

Another thing that aggravates me about JKR. She can't make a character realistically racist, she has to force him to act erratically and dumb him down to pull it off. *eyeroll*

I think Olivander shows us a spell in GOF to make wine fly out of their wands. Maybe Draco’s just discovered this, and currently drunk off his arse

Lol. Though they're allowed to drink butterbeer, that doesn't have alcoholic properties?

And hey, is that contravening Gamp's Laws or what? Oh, no, it's just food that supposedly can't be produced by wands- although why food, arbitrarily, and not water or wine, IDK. (Molly has no trouble making 'creamy sauce pour out the wand' in GoF...)

[aikaterini.livejournal.com]

/I mean, jeez, when is a guy ever described as bossy? Never! He's strong and confident and a million other positive adjectives, not bossy!/

I think that Percy is often described as being bossy. If not in the books, then by the fandom.

/I rather hate the way Harry coldly uses Myrtle- yes, she's annoying, but she's sad and lonely, and she basically helps save his life by giving him info in GoF, but he just crosses his fingers when he promises to visit her. Some gratitude./

Well, in Harry's defense, Myrtle *is* a little creepy in GoF when she makes remarks about seeing him in the bath, as well as Cedric. But it is interesting how differently Draco and Harry treat her.

/Another thing that aggravates me about JKR. She can't make a character realistically racist, she has to force him to act erratically and dumb him down to pull it off. *eyeroll*/

Like when Draco makes a stupid remark about touching Hermione's hands in GoF, makes some feeble taunt about Harry's Muggle-born mother in OotP, and when he makes the even more immature remark about Hermione's "smell" in HBP. If Draco has to be racist, could he at least be more subtle about it, indicating some degree of cunning and intelligence on his part? I'd think that it would hurt Hermione more if he used that approach, because then he wouldn't sound like a racist parrot who was just repeating the same insult over and over again. Unless he realizes that Hermione doesn't care and he's just spouting off like that to annoy Harry and Ron.

[majorjune.livejournal.com]

Randomly, I hate the word 'bossy'. It seems developed solely to put down females who are assertive and not meekly melting into the background as they ought in the presence of their male superiors.

Back around 1970 the feminist group The Red-Stocking Collective published "The Bitch Manifesto", the basic premise of which was that all the qualities that when shown by a woman resulted in her being labeled "bitch", were all qualities that were considered positive when shown by a man -- as you point out, strength and confidence, also intelligence, assertiveness, ambition, boldness, and a healthy sense of self-worth.

The word "bossy" I think is just a polite codeword for "bitch"... :-/

[robina1984.livejournal.com]

jeez, when is a guy ever described as bossy? Never! He's strong and confident and a million other positive adjectives, not bossy!

Different fandom, but Leonardo is often called "bossy" (Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle fandom) in narration, generally if one of his brothers is the one we see the scene through. I've seen a few random X-men fics of Cyclops being called bossy, but that was years ago. Um...I think there's a few others, but I've been in the TMNT fandom too long to remember them. I used to branch out more....

[harpsi-fizz.livejournal.com]

* Filch has been cleaning all morning when any of the teachers (and probably quite a few of the pupils) could have done it in an instant with a quick “Scourgify!” No wonder he’s in a bad mood, really.

Gosh... I think you've made me an official Filch Fan/sympathizer. I want to know more about him. How'd he get to be a more or less human house elf? How old is he? When did he get his cat?

Damn. Now I feel awful.

* Filch is obviously ashamed of being a Squib, suggesting that they suffer from prejudice from fellow wizards, unlike Muggleborns. “Mudblood” is still a worse insult than “Sneakin’ Squib,” though.

I can't even begin to try to put together the hierarchy and "ism" here.

They probably hold a big party in their common room every time it’s the Bloody Baron’s deathday.
Love this idea. Hey, where is the Baron? Is he not invited to Nick's party?

F&G are feeding a firework to a salamander, continuing the long tradition of cruelty to animals in the series.
Sign of psychopathy in youngsters is animal torture at an early age. I feel bad saying it, but I'm actually really glad Fred died. I always saw him as the instigator. Now George is free. ... Except having lived so long with his brother that the psychological grip will never truly allow him to be free, so he marries his brother's old date, names his kid after his brother and puts on his brother's old clothes and talks to himself.
But nobody thinks it's strange because "they were so close" (oh, if only they knew the horrors) and anyhow, Fred's clothes fit him.

[ladyhadhafang.livejournal.com]

* I can’t help but wonder why Dumbles keeps Peeves around. Possibly it’s so that he can handily distract Filch when Our Hero is in trouble. Or maybe blackmail’s involved. “Don’t forget, Twinkles, I’ve got your old love-letters from Gellert Grindlewald. So if you even think about getting rid of me…”

XD

Thank you, you just made my day.

And that revenge fic with Harry...I'd like to read that. :)


* “Time to kill… I smell blood… I SMELL BLOOD”? Do basilisks always speak in such a melodramatic way, or is it just putting it on to amuse Harry? Or did it just pick up the Slytherin theatrical habit from Salazar or Tom?

XD XD XD

* Actually, I think Olivander shows us a spell in GOF to make wine fly out of their wands. Maybe Draco’s just discovered this, and currently drunk off his arse.

* Or maybe Rowling just hooked his testicles up to car batteries and turned up the voltage until he agreed to be one of the book’s red herrings.


Oooh...*Crosses legs* God*damn*. Damn damn damn damn OWIE!

But aside from the brief "Sharing the Pain" moment, QGCB sounds...genius, actually. :D

[sweettalkeress.livejournal.com]

" “Time to kill… I smell blood… I SMELL BLOOD”? Do basilisks always speak in such a melodramatic way, or is it just putting it on to amuse Harry? Or did it just pick up the Slytherin theatrical habit from Salazar or Tom?"

Well... if you consider that snakes in real life aren't actually all that smart, it might very well be that the snake would have to say these sorts of things to remind itself of them, because it can't think except in terms of "I need to kill something, I smell blood, I need to eat..." ad infinitum.