confessions of a harry potter fanatic

sorry the picture is distorted . . . but it's real. this is my 11th birthday and the presents i got that day--ignore the face plate and look at HP2 and 3 at the bottom of the picture.

i was around 11 when i first started reading harry potter. this is significant, because in case you have lived in a cave for the last 10 years, harry is also 11 when the series starts--thus creating a bond between me and harry of as we went through life together, although mine was significantly less fraught with peril and voldemort.

if i weren't such a devoted fan, i would be embarrassed by how many times i've read the books. i'll just say . . . it's probably more times than you've read them. probably more times than j.k. rowling herself. our original copy of hp1 literally fell apart because i read it so many times. same with all the other books--i practically had them memorized. i remember practically every bit of hp trivia that nobody needs to know, because i spent probably months of my young life reading and re-reading and RE-reading harry potter. for example, did any of you know that hagrid was in hufflepuff when he was at hogwarts? and do you remember harry potter's birthday? (july 31.) did you know that j.k. rowling said that ginny was on a professional quidditch team after she and harry were married, before they decided to start a family?

i did.

really. hp was my THING. i'm not ashamed. i still love it.

that's a big part of the reason why, over a month ago, tommy and i borrowed all seven of the harry potter books on audiobook from the provo library. we have totally converted to doing books on tape for all our roadtrips, and a ton of people had told us that hp on tape was awesome. 115 hours of awesomeness.

however, our drive to north carolina was only something like 48 hours. so we only finished the first three and a half books during our drive. so we spent the last two or three weeks since getting here trying to finish them, because once we start a project like that, we get super determined to finish it. like when i watched all five seasons of the office in one week. and when tommy watched all six star wars in the weekend. (that is something i never knew i loved so much about tommy--he not only tolerates my weird obsessive personality, he obsesses over the same things. he doesn't get sick of listening to the same song over and over and over AND OVER again--he voluntarily turns the song on and dances to it when i have been secretly wanting to listen to it but afraid of being annoying. he's the best.)

so, we've spent hours every day as we were unpacking and cleaning and moving in, just following harry through his trials. we've been noticing harry potter connections to real life EVERYWHERE--in class, in church, in conversations with other normal and not-hp-obsessed people--so it's probably a good thing that we finished just a few days ago.

long story short, if any of you are in any way inclined towards hp, i would highly recommend the books on tape. they're great for a road trip. and just everyday life.

bennett and hyrum, 2 of our best cousins, who are on missions right now. they're magical too. we all went to the midnight release of the 7th book at the barnes and noble in st. louis, and they turned us away and wouldn't let us buy one because we hadn't reserved it. RUDE. but at least we still got to do some magic.

LONG LIVE THE BOY WHO LIVED.

editor's note: my mom reminded me that i also met j.k. rowling when i was 11. more proof of my fandom.

also, tommy and i have started on the movies. we own 1-5 thanks to our movie shopping spree in china. good-bye, weekend.