Harry Potter and the Countdown of Doom...

[Clevernick]

Got the book!

In the lineup I saw mostly young women. Some were dressed as broomsticks, Harry, assorted witches, Mad-eye Moody, and even Hogwarts itself.

On two occasions I passed young ladies offering "free hugs". In one case it was a cluster-hug.

On one occasion I stopped to have a theoretical conversation on Snape's homosexual longings for James Potter with some university girls from around here, all of whom were wearing drawn-on round spectacles, but one had radish earrings (Luna Lovegood), and another had a carefully drawn death-eater tattoo.

I saw a CNN newscaster (who looked awfully young!) trying for a good 20 minutes to record a 1 minute segment on the excitement and chaos. She kept screwing up her memorized lines (no teleprompter in the street) and having to read them over and start again. Her lines were all in Spanish (CNN Espanol) but everytime she screwed up she would switch to English to chat with the camera crew.

She was lying in the report, too -- she claimed it was "meno de un hora" until the release, but it was only 10:30 at the time. I assume they planned to release the taped report a bit later on.

Anyway, I have the book. As a bonus for showing up tonight, I got a free copy of "A Guide to Wizards of the World".

Now I will be reading on my balcony until it's done. Don't tell me the ending, please.