Friday Five: Wotcher, Harry! ...and not.

Posted by reverendmother at RevGalBlogPals

As you may have seen in this Wednesday's Festival, Pottermania has hit the RevGals---though not all of them. Yes, I am all over Harry like a Seeker on the Snitch, but I know there are others who will be ecstatic to see the July madness end.

So today's F5 is a Choose Your Own Adventure: do the magical version or the Muggle one, or both:

Option 1: Accio Friday Five!

1. Which Harry Potter book is your favorite and why?
I'd have to say that Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince is my favorite thus far, for sheer suspense and the sense that things are starting to draw toward a major climax. [No spoilers here for those of you who might be interested in still reading the entire tale!]

2. Which character do you most resemble? Which character would you most like to get to know?
I get the feeling I resemble McGonagall the most (aside from being both a Muggle and a man, of course). She seems exactly the kind of no-nonsense, fiery person I aspire to be. Besides, no everyone gets to be Harry or Dumbledore. I will say that being Charlie Weasley would be cool - chasing dragons and such. [Added later] I would like to get to know McGonagall better - she just seems interesting to me for some reason!

3. How careful are you about spoilers?
a) bring 'em on--even if I know the destination, the journey's still good
b) eh, I'd rather not know what happens, but I'm not going to commit Avada Kedavra if someone makes a slip
c) I will sequester myself in a geodesic dome to avoid finding anything out
Definitely C for me. I'm careful like Hermione cooking up a potion for Snape's class. I HATE knowing the end of the story/movie. The really unfortunate thing is that I married a "read the last page of the book first" woman, so we have a row about spoilers every time a new Harry Potter book comes out. In fact, we had one last night on our way home from the Transformers movie. (Transformers, Harry Potter, what am I, eight again?) And there are others in my life who do the same (do you hear me, LH?).

4. Make one prediction/share one hope about book 7.


[SPOILER ALERT!!!]





I think Hagrid will meet an unfortunate end early in the book and I think Harry will sacrifice himself in the end to save the world from Voldemort.
Oh, and one hope: I hope that Dumbledore and Sirius aren't really dead.





[SPOILERS END]


5. Rowling has said she's not planning any prequels or sequels, but are there characters or storylines (past or future) that you would like to see pursued?
Definitely the relationship between Lupin, Sirius Black and the Potters, and perhaps Albus Dumbledore's backstory as well.


Option 2: Please Mommy, Anything But Those Blankety-Blank Books!

And we do mean anything:

1. Former U.S. First Lady "Lady Bird" Johnson died this week. In honor of her love of the land and the environment, share your favorite flower or wildflower.
Definitely the mandrake, although care and feeding can be...what? Oh, MUGGLE plants. Gotcha. Can I share my least favorite plant? Well, I don't care: I'm gonna. I DESPISE COTTONWOOD TREES. We have several around our house, and although they are beautiful, tall and sound really cool when a breeze blows through at night, they also shed bark, branches and debris all over the yard and cottonwood seed gets into everything every summer and makes our house look like it's molting.
2. A man flew almost 200 miles in a lawn chair, held aloft by helium balloons. Share something zany you'd like to try someday.
Sky-diving. I want to jump out of a perfectly good airplane somewhere between 5,000 and 10,000 feet. I don't know why - I'm scared of heights and would never consider bungee jumping; I don't even like those rides at the fair where they put you in a harness, pull you way up in the air and let you swing at the end of a long cable, but I want to go sky-diving someday.

3. Do you have an iPhone? If not, would you want one?
I would love to have an iPhone, but not until the cost drops a bit (and I wear out my Palm Pilot so I can justify the expense).

4. Speaking of which, Blendtec Blenders put an iPhone in one of their super-duper blenders as part of their "Will It Blend?" series. What would YOU like to see ground up, whizzed up or otherwise pulverized in a blender?
You mean other than the Vice President? How about the idiots at NBC who cancelled "Studio 60 On The Sunset Strip" but left "Age of Love" and "Wedding Crashers" on their fall schedule? No people? Okay, how about, ummm, any Bluetooth earpiece worn outside of an automobile? No offense to any Bluetooth users out there, but that thing in your ear makes you look like a pretentious, self-important git.

5. According to News of the Weird, a jury in Weld County, Colo., declined to hold Kathleen Ensz accountable for leaving a flier containing her dog's droppings on the doorstep of U.S. Rep. Marilyn Musgrave, apparently agreeing with Ensz that she was merely exercising free speech. What do you think? Is doggy doo-doo protected by the First Amendment?
Only if it means I can exercise my right to free speech on the White House lawn. One could argue that because the doo-doo was in a portable container, it was permissible; had there been smearing involved, it might have crossed the line, don't you think?