I'm just going to point out that arson is a child's crime. It really is for fourteen year olds with matches and a can of lighter fluid and more daddy issues than you can shake a stick at.

What are you going to do after this, tie a maiden to the railroad tracks and laugh maniacally as twirl your moustache? Honestly.

You're not scary. You're just...sort of lame.

( Emmeline )

( Private )

( Dumbledore and, well, all the Order members. Sure, why not. )

Remember that time when I wrote in this?

Me too. Then NEWTs happened. And a variety of other things. And it was, in a way, so much easier to keep this thing closed.

But NEWTs are, astonishingly, over. And thus school is...over. Suddenly I have more time on my hands. So let us open this up again.

I have found a job, that starts in a few weeks. It is...almost too hilarious to talk about just yet. Shenanigans. That's what it will be. Shenanigans.

( Private )

( Dorcas )

( Emmeline )

I don't..

I don't know.

I just don't know. About anything. About what I should be doing or why or how or why or why or why.

I'm going to take the night. Just. I just need that right now.

( Private like a very private thing )

( Emmeline )

Scotland does not seem to want to give up winter. Somehow, somewhere it's spring. But not here yet. Not by a long shot.

( Private )

( Emmeline )

Can't sleep. Not with the rain playing at the windows, filling the air with steady sound and making the whole world seem misty and unsubstantial. Though, let's be honest, it's not like I can ever really sleep. 'S alright though.

Have almost got used to sleeping in a real bed again. It's a wonder how quick you get used to sleeping on a bed roll. Miss all those sigils over the place too. Couldn't get enough of them.

Home.

Home again, and in one piece.

Exhausted beyond complete sentences.

Sleeping until the wedding, unless anyone (read: Emmeline) needs me.

Don't ask me how it went yet.

( Arrive to Emmeline that morning by a very weary sort of parrot )

Dorcas? I can't find the pot. Do you have it? If we don't have the pot it makes boiling the water pretty hard. And considering the middle of the jungle thing, I'd rather boil the water before drinking it. Tropical diseases and I are enemies.

I think we might have made a wrong turn at some point today too. My thinking is that we should go more west to get to the ruins.

Oi.

In case you were wondering, me and Dorcas are going on a trip in a while. Couple weeks. Then we'll be gone for a couple weeks. Then we'll be back. So...just a head's up in case anyone who didn't already know cares.

In other news, it's bloody cold. Cold and snowy and all around unpleasant. Fie, February. Fie on you. I am curled in blankets and I am still cold. This is unacceptable weather.

Also, Ted, do you know where the stack of books near the closet went? I need one of them and can't locate the whole group of them.

( Private )

( Dorcas )

( Private )

( Dorcas )

( Emmeline )

To those concerned,

I am about to go return some of those library books you like to complain about so much. Not all of them, by a long shot, but a couple of them. So kindly be quiet about how unfair it is and so forth.

And you can just work out which books it is, because I'm not really going to oblige you.

In other news, I would like to go sledding.

( Private )

( Headmaster )

I just want you to know, if anyone cares, that I have worked it out. And that occasionally perseverance and insomnia end well. Not end, maybe. But at least this part of it has worked out.

This is so incredibly a bit of a victory.

In other news, would any of you use the word 'whishy' to describe me? Discuss.

( Private )

( Dorcas )

( Kingsley )

( Emmeline )

So...how is everyone on this fine December morning? All doing well? Acacia, did you ever find your broom?

Christmas, I think, will be lovely. It will be good to get home and see family. My sister is making rumblings about throwing a party, which should be all sorts of absurdity and debauchery in equal measures. Maybe we will see if some of you folks can come.

Of course, Christmas means I have to go...attend to purchasing people gifts. And I don't think EVERYONE I know wants to get second-hand books, even from a lovely used bookshop.

( Private )

*writing is a little bit shaky*

Not really feeling that well, I don't think I'm going to make it to classes today. So if someone could lend me their Runes and Charms notes tonight, I'd really appreciate it.

Name 5 simple pleasures that you like most, then pick 5 people to do the same.

1. How it is impossible to eat popsicles during summer without getting your mouth and fingers all sticky. Especially when they're the sort that stain your lips and tongue blue or green or what have you. It's just such a summertime thing.

2. Clear winter nights at school, sharp and deep enough that you look up at the sky and see forever.

3. Christmas carols. Which I know makes me about the biggest dork on the planet, but I'm very fond of them. They're all just very familiar and soothing, but they're so, so beautiful. Especially when you know the person singing them.

4. Nights when I actually sleep. This has been happening more often lately, which is of the good.

5. The way once you get ink on your fingers it never, ever seems to come off. It stains your fingers and the cuffs of every single one of my shirts, sometimes I manage to get it on my forehead with no idea how it got there. But I like the way it's lasting, how just his little smear of blue shows you've been there before, touch of the past.

I'd like to see...hmmm...Emmeline, Dorcas, Kingsley, Amos and Ted to do, if you please. But anyone can do it, really.

( Headmaster )

Dorcas? Have your first day yet? I want to hear all about you and the kidlets. I am also still all a-curious as to this surprise. And I've still something to show you, when you've the time.

I think I'm just going to give up on trying to study in the library. Pince glares at me, also it is filled with 14 year olds, who are just tremendously and awkwardly hormonal.

It's been real sunny lately, hasn't it? I rather like it, but even the sun is a gray sort of haze at this point. Oh, November. Not properly any season at all.

Not that I see much of the sun at all, for, lo, 7th Year lends itself to much studying and burning of the midnight oil. Not that we wouldn't all be up at odd hours anyway, but the fact remains.

Dorcas, when do you show your face here? I am looking forward to seeing you. I also have something very...interesting to show you. Interesting and frustrating in equal measures.

I am in the mood to know things. So tell me something I don't know about you. You can spell yourself anonymous if you like, I can guess. But...I am interested in knowing things about folk that I did not know before.

( Private )

Remember, remember the fifth of November,
Gunpowder Treason and Plot,
I see no reason why gunpowder treason
should ever be forgot.

I think tonight there should be fireworks. And I think it's a terrible shame that it's cloudy, and that there can't be.

But there are going to be toffee apples at dinner tonight, maybe? In the spirit of things and, also, delicious.

It's interesting, Guy Fawkes Day. I think it has interesting connotations for today, you know? That today's a holiday and bears the name of conspirator to blow up a government building. That we can be far enough away from the actual event to just chant rhymes and eat toffee apples, without really being worried about it.

Well, not worried about it. But not...there's no imminent threat from that particular group, anyway. Not really.

( Private )

This?

And this?

This is unacceptable.

This is unacceptable.

I want to preface this by saying that I have a cold.

So if I sound grumpy or out of it, that is simply because I can't breath through my nose.

Anyway.

Halloween is coming and no, I have no costume yet. I haven't really been thinking about it too much.

Has everyone kept on allright in my congestion-induced absence? Yes? No?

((am only sort of here.))

If anyone has the Runes work from Friday and Monday, I'd really appreciate borrowing it.

That's pretty much it.

( Private )

This is me.

These are my hands.

These are my hands being thrown in the air in exasperation and confusion.

This is me.

With the books.

Not coming out for a bit.

( Private )

It's been a while, I guess.

Lots has gone on.

School is school is school. Strange, something that consumes so much of my energy and thought doesn't really require that much reflection. Classes are all going well, DADA has been all sorts of interesting the past few days.

Sex-Ed really, truly sounds like ten shades of hilarious. Not that I am going to go, but it sounds like it would be SO RIDICULOUS.

( Private )