Turn The Otter Cheek

My mother called me earlier this evening to inform me that she'd seen War Horse at the cinema with her friend on Monday.

Mum: And it was great - I mean, you wouldn't think a horse could act but this one did!

Me: Um...

Mum: No, really! It looked sad when it was supposed to, and then when it was running through the fields and stuff it looked really happy.

Me: It's amazing what cinematic technology can do.

Mum: And then there was this part, right, when I turned to my friend and I said "that horse fancies that other horse", and she said "how do you know?" and I said "because it looked at it funny".

Me: (pinching my nose) Your grasp of animal courting expressions is quite astounding.

In addition to this, today my friends and I had an email conversation about - what else - Harry Potter. Wetsoks and I have been writing a fanfiction (I won't even tell you what it is about, suffice to say that the word 'Whorecrux' features in it quite heavily) and she announced to the groups how awesome our stats were. In fact, discouragingly, the Harry Potter story is now outgrossing this blog in terms of visitors. The world is a dark and otterless place sometimes. Still, we soldier on. 

Wetsoks: We've had almost 4000 hits now!

Tanyakit: (email contains party graphics and many implied Huzzahs)

Me: Your Clemence Poesy obsession is dwindling, we see. I actually opened this email expecting to see only the words "needs more Fleur".

Tanyakit: That should be implied in all my emails. This stomach ache is absolutely killing me...I feel like a zombie. I now have sympathy for their rampages.

Me: Zombies don’t feel feelings or pain, dude. That’s why nothing affects them except decapitation and the like.

Tanyakit: Well they might have feelings but just feel no physical pain?

Me: You cannot bribe a zombie to do something because of innate or leftover emotions. They are walking corpses with no mental activity and certainly no heart. Or say, we could test this theory when the apocalypse happens. You first. No, I insist.

Tanyakit: ANYWAY. I was rather enjoying a very liberal Hogwarts fic last night where Fleur as the Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher had to share quarters with Hermione as Head Girl. Oh, and a bed. As you do. It made me wonder whether a)     This was the impact of a recession, and b)    Why I wasn’t lucky enough to share a bed with a Fleur look-a-like when I was in school – I think it would have helped me come out much much earlier. 

Me: Ah yes, the recession hit the magical community the hardest. I think Professor McGonagall has suggested upping the quantities of root vegetables in the students’ diets (Tanyakit, if you’d read the amazing story called Matching Muff Matrimony - during which a drunken Ginny Weasley hits and kills Voldemort while driving the Ford, and accidentally becomes the Saviouress of the Wizarding World - you’d understand this joke) to cut down on the house elves’ food budget. 

Tanyakit: She should be upping root vegetable quantity regardless — am surprised they aren’t all 20 stone what with the diet of sugar and cholesterol which Dumbledore constantly feeds them.

Me: I actually laughed out loud at the root vegetable thing – you do have a point. And pumpkin juice for every meal? What if you don’t like it? And why pumpkins – because they are so magical? What a horrible choice of drink. I'm surprised the students aren’t all keeling over from dehydration as well.

Tanyakit: Conspiracy theorists would ask who really started the war, and brought it all the Hogwarts—Voldermort? Or was it just a cunning plan by Dumbledore to have half of Hogwarts killed off before they died of premature heart attacks which would have undoubtedly prompted an inquest into how these children were being taken care of...

Me: Not to mention the daily verbal and physical abuse of some pupils by certain teachers, which I’m sure is not to the standards of education/human rights that the Scottish Qualifications Authority, or indeed the parents, would like.  Severus Snape in particular should have been suspended on more than one occasion for wielding his authority in a harmful and mentally torturous way particularly over children whose parents were either killed by or maimed beyond belief by his previous employer, which is frankly rubbing salt in the wound a bit more than is necessary.

Tanyakit: I think the entire plot of the Goblet of Fire would have fallen foul of the SQA. “What do you mean people die in this tournament?! I am pulling Jimmy this instant.”  “Yes, sorry it’s a binding contract..."   “My son is underage...shouldn’t I have signed a permission slip or something?!”   "Please see my previous response.”

Me: “But you require parents to sign permission slips to allow children to go to the local village at the weekend! Why not for this pointless Tournament Of Death?”          “…Have a biscuit, sir.”