HP Book One: Chapter 1

Greetings!

So today begins my reread of the entire Harry Potter series! I've finished reading chapter one and surprisingly I have learned a lot about my 19-year-old self and my 9-year-old self. This was meant to be funny and lighthearted and it is so laugh at me as I rediscover my inner child.

Chapter Title: The Boy Who Lived
What I Would Call It: The Dursleys Are Even More Boring Than I Remembered

The story begins with sentence that every Harry Potter fan knows almost by heart or can at least associate with the story:

"Mr.and Mrs. Dursley, of number four, Privet Drive, were proud to say that they were perfectly normal, thank you very much."

Even now, 10 years after I've read this book for the very first time, it still makes me immediately hate the Dursleys. It probably makes me hate them now because I already know that they're made of fail, but I can't quite wrap my brain around why I hated them on principle when I was nine. Probably because I was so desperate to fit in and be normal at that age, but deep down I knew that I wasn't and that normal people made me angry for hating on us weirdos.

Moving right along though, I rediscover the reason that I've only read book one twice.

Because I hate exposition. Because it's boring.

And I'm old enough to know now that Jo wasn't writing about boring stuff to make me angry, she wrote about it because she probably wanted to make a point about how mind numbingly boring and run-of-the-mill the Dursleys are so you can later compare it to how extraordinary the story becomes.

Does not make it any less boring.

But I do relearn somethings that I learned when I was nine.

For starters, Mr. Dursley works for a company that makes drills. When I read this book when I was nine and again when I was 14 I could not for the life of my wrap my head around what drills were. Like it was weird British slang for something. Like it was paper or a different way to say law firm. I don't know why it took me turning 19 to figure out that it just means drills, which essentially means that the two times I picked up this book, I forgot drills existed. Not to mention, I have an aunt in the National Guard so my brain immediately goes to like military drills and stuff as opposed to a power tool.

I have issues.

But aside from my blatant stupidity, I read a few things that have stuck with me since reading the book the first time that make me laugh.

The image of Mrs. Dursley having a neck like a giraffe and craning it over fences to spy on neighbors. that imagery was apparently so powerful to me that any time someone says I'm craning my neck to look at something I stop because my desire to not be like Mrs. Durlsey is so powerful. I laugh on the inside every time I do it. It's like a reflex.

Then there's Dudley and it makes me sad that he doesn't want to grow up to be a Canadian mounty because what's the point in having that name if you're not going to continually try to thwart your nemesis Snidely Whiplash?

And lastly, Jo Rowling invents the word "unDursleyish" and I remember that I love her.

But then we go on to hear more about the Dursley and I read the line that made me finish reading the chapter when I was nine: "a cat reading a map." When I read that for the first time, even though Mr. Dursley dismissed it as nothing I knew we would come back to it and that's why I wanted to finish reading it.

Which for me was really painful since the next few pages are all about Mr. Dursley and his sucktastic job. Sure there was the mention of owls and that random wizard who hugged him and called him a muggle (which, honestly, would put me off too), but overall I just could not wait for it to be over and for him to bring up the name Harry Potter again.

And it happens--except Mrs. Dursley calls Harry a nasty and common name. I think people in glass houses shouldn't throw stone. I mean, you named your kid Dudley.

Anyway, the best thing ever happens after that--they go to be and I applaud.

And the something better happens--enter Albus Dumbledore clad in a purple cloak and high healed, buckled boots. My gaydar was totally turned off I was a kid. Not only did I not catch that Dumbledore was gay judging by his fantastic taste in wizard apparel, but my favorite person at the time was the guy who ran the after school daycare I went to at the time was incredibly gay also and I totally missed it.


After Dumbledore catches all the lights and the lights and secures his place as my favorite character of all time (until book 3 whe I fall in love with Remus J. Lupin) he goes back to that cat who turns out to be McGonagall.


Then I see a name that I remember from later books: Dedalus Diggle who "never had much sense."


Dumbledore offers McGonagall a lemon drop but apparently she doesn't think this is the time for lemon drops. Clearly McGonagall doesn't know that it's always time for lemon drops. I wish I had a lemon drop right now.


After this exchange which, made me giggle more than it should have, they mention Voldemort for the first time ever. It feels like only yesterday I couldn't figure out how to pronounce that name. . .


Now, here's when nine-year-old me got really confused. Apparently, Voldemort killed Lily and James Potter but couldn't kill their one-year-old son, Harry. But then again, babies are resilient creatures. Ever seen a baby swallow a dime and poop it out hours later like it was nothing? Have you ever tried to swallow a dime? You can't. You choke and more often than not die. Clearly the same principle can apply here to explain why Voldemort is a bad baby killer.

Enter lovable Hagrid on Sirius Black's (squeal! Fan girl!) flying motorbike, which now just makes me sad.

But on a more important note, Hagrid says the house was nearly destroyed which baffled me. Like the house blew up or caught fire or something happened and Voldemort still didn't kill Harry? The baby didn't die in the fire or the explosion that he caused? Way to be made of fail Voldemort.

They leave Harry with the Dursley and wish him good luck and the chapter ends with "To Harry Potter--The Boy Who Lived!"

And here's to Voldemort--The Man That Let the Boy Live.

Sweetest Day

Greetings!

So, I live in the wonderful city of Cleveland, Ohio and here in this grand ol' city we celebrate a holiday that's useless as a bucket warm spit.

Sweetest Day.

Never heard of it? Of course you haven't. That's because it's a dumb holiday only celebrated in the Great Lakes regions.

Why does this dumb holiday exist? Well, for that I did some research.

It didn't start out all bad of course. It was invented in 1921 by a group of candy makers who wanted to spread cheer and love and happiness to the poor unfortunate souls who live around here. That's fantastic, isn't it? And on that day they went and gave candy to orphans, the homeless, etc.

What a sweet things to do right? I certainly think so.

But of course, like many things in our society that are meant to spread good, it's dissolved, some how into another holiday that causes girls to be cynics, guys to be douche bags, and for couples to be lovey over.

I never fell into any of those categories. I don't even fall into the category of the girl who gets pissed at her boyfriend for forgetting the stupid holiday.

I fall into the category of "my boyfriend and I both think this holiday is so dumb that we're going to make a point to not do anything on it every year."

This is our second Sweetest Day together. He's working and I'm here, blogging about how stupid I think it is.

Mission accomplished.

Still, if you really think Sweetest Day is SO important and you feel the need to be a cynic or pissed off at your boyfriend, then happy Sweetest Day to you.

I'm gonna go do some dishes and find something more useful to do than remember that this holiday exist.

Fare thee well,
April

I'm A Writer, Trust Me and Team Jess Forever

Greetings!

Well, ugh! Just, ugh!

I have been without internet for far too long, but alas, I have it again...

So I guess the proper way to phrase that sentence would be to say "I had been with internet for far too long."

At least I hope that's right. I never learned too many fundamentals in school because I've been able to read since I was 4 so I know the basics instinctively (Like, I totally know I should've just typed out the word "four" instead of putting the number but whatever) but I still get hung on things when I'm writing which is bad being that I want to be a writer and all.

When I write blogs and journals and junk like that, I'm pretty bad. Because I'm just doing it for fun or to organize my thoughts (which never happens) I don't really care how it turns out, so I always wonder if people look at my blogs and then take into account the fact that I want to be a writer and then are appalled by how awful my writing is and think that I'm going nowhere fast (obviously, no one taught me about run on sentences either. Sheesh! Public schools I tell ya.)

But, let me be clear, when I sit down to write something that I hope to work on for six or seven drafts afterward, I'm not too shabby. No first draft is good (NaNoWriMo taught me that). But my first drafts are significantly better than anything I blog on the fly--I certainly hope you didn't think that I actually think about what I'm going to blog before I blog it. Usually I just get a feeling "April, blog. Now. Just go do it" and I do it. There's seriously no more thought in it than that. Sorry to disappoint you if you thought otherwise.

Moving right along, I've just moved. It's great. I'm slowly learning how to cook for myself and the most challenging part of that is trying to figure out to clean off the stove the next day after all the grease and crud is stuck on it. Challenging, especially since I have only a rag and just yesterday got suitable dish soap (why people use anything other than Dawn or Palmolive I'll never know).

In the meanwhile, I've been watching a lot of Gilmore Girls. I love Gilmore Girls and watching it has made me want to write nothing but fluff, fluff, and more fluff, which I don't mind but I'm sure everyone else who is used to me writing Science Fiction is kind of put off by it.

Anyway (and I've seriously been trying to get to this point since I started writing this blog!), it reminded me of BEDA and how I made a post dedicated to my favorite ships and Gilmore Girls reminded me of one I left out:

Rory and Jess!

Now, I tweeted about this earlier--Jess was always my favorite guy. Of all the guys Rory dated I loved him the most and I desperately wanted things to work out with them. I wanted them to be together forever and it breaks my heart that things didn't turn out that way. I mean, I liked Dean at the start. He was very tall and I like very tall guys so I thought "awesome go for it." But then, he got kind of clingy and slightly douchey and I was like, "Ugh, Dean. Go away." I think I stopped liking him after he told Rory he loved her.

And then Jess came to town. Can I just say how adorable young Milo Ventimiglia is? I love him so much and he's kind of a dick but he's supposed to be the bad boy so obviously he's supposed to be that way. But then Dean gets all defensive and territorial, which I get, I wouldn't want some cuter guy with better hair moving in on my lady either, but OMG, Dean, I have yet to meet a girl that's impressed by the whole "Me Tarzan. You Jane. Me protect you" bit. Ugh. Annoying.

Now, I have to say this, though I detest Dean, I felt bad for him. When Rory kissed Jess--totally not okay. And all of that flirting with another guy while you're with some other guy is not okay either. And I want to say "man up and grow some balls" but I know boys can be sensitive too. They have feelings. I know if I did something like that with my boyfriend he'd be upset (of course, that would never happen because I'm not a bad person like Rory).

And on that note, yes, Rory is a bad person. For leading Dean on, but for also leading Jess on. I've already discussed Dean, but not Jess, my favorite.When Rory went to New York to see Jess I thought that they'd get together there. But no. Then I prayed that after they kissed at Sookie's wedding that Rory was running off to break up with Dean because her heart was with Jess. But no. She went to Washington, D.C and continued to have a relationship with Dean to prove to herself that she didn't want Jess.

Stupid girl. That's like choosing Edward over Jacob (except you have better options).

And then when she gets back from D.C. and gets all pissy when Jess is with Shane (have I mentioned I hate Shane?). And then Jess says something totally justified--that she has no right to be angry about him being with some other girl. After all, she never wrote, she never called, never e-mailed, etc. She never showed any indication that she wanted to be with Jess after she ran off to D.C. AND she was (stupidly) still with Dean.

So Jess drove her mad until she got some sense (Oxymoron? Yes, but that's what happened).

Well, no that's a lie. That's not what happened. Jess drove Rory AND Dean mad until Dean realized he was obsolete and then Rory finally saw the light.

And then Jess and Rory began and it was wonderful and sadly short lived. Jess and Rory had their ups and downs because Jess was still figuring himself out which I'm sure is frustrating. In fact I know it's frustrating. I saw how frustrated everyone got when I dropped out of university to go to junior college. Good for me, upsetting and confusing for the rest of the population.

But Jess was a real person. He was so real and he loved Rory so much it drove him crazy. He loved her so much that he didn't want to let her down and that when he did he just couldn't face her. And while that is totally crummy of him to do, you could tell he loved her.

Because he knew Rory would stay with him through everything, but rather than drag her along down his path that seemed to go nowhere, he set her free to go to Yale and meet someone else, even though he loved her.

And that's why Jess is my favorite. When Rory couldn't say she loved Dean, he got mad and left her. And when Rory said no to Logan's proposal he got mad and left her.

Jess didn't want Rory to be with a failure so he left her so she also wouldn't be a failure.

Rory was right--Jess should've said he wasn't graduating and that he couldn't go to prom and that all this bad stuff was happening so they could work it out. It's not okay to run from your problems, Jess. Not okay. But, I still think it was admirable of him not to drag Rory down with him.

Before Jess, I liked Tristan. He was a tool, but there was a person underneath there somewhere.

I like Logan better than Dean but he seemed ritzier than someone I would've put Rory with. Logan's cool don't get me wrong, and when he proposed I had hoped she'd say yes but, alas.

And remember Marty? They never actually went out or anything but he was kind of okay. I liked him more than Dean but less than Logan. Marty acted like he was on his period a lot which was kind of really annoying.

Dean also acted like he was on his period a lot... I'm also irritated that he tried to steal Rory from Jess by trying to work his way up through the friend zone. And I know, that's EXACTLY what Jess did, but Jess did it better and by the time Dean did it, it's already been done.

My favorite Rory and Jess moment: When Rory had to fix that sprinkler that was broken when she was watering that guy's lawn and Jess came and helped her, but as soon as she told him Dean was coming, he broke it again so he could fix it for her instead. It was totally adorable. It would've only been cuter if he had kissed her on the cheek.

I only imagine that after the series ended, Rory ran into Jess somewhere on the campaign trail while she followed Obama around for her online news magazine. The two hit it off, realized they were still perfect for each other, especially since they're adults and no longer ruled completely by hormones, and spend all of eternity together.

Because I love Jess. Team Jess Forever.

I am such a loser and shouldn't be allowed internet access after midnight.

Fare the well,
April