Draco C. Malfoy

Extraction and Diversion - all staff are headed to Bum's office. Clear out and return to common rooms as discreetly as possible.

It becomes infinitely more difficult to think of interesting topics to write about when one is told that they must post interesting topics on a weekly basis. It also has the unfortunate side-effect of making one ponder all sorts of peculiar things about rules and obedience and their limits versus their usefulness. I think there might well be a way to proof the outcome using arithmancy, but I haven't yet had time to try.

But I'm hardly one to disobey rules. However, it might be a good communal activity if we all put our heads together and thought of a list of topics that we can easily access, should some of us find ourselves floundering for something to write about, but remain eager to put our best selves forward. This should at least hold us over until we receive the essay prompts that have been promised to us.

Topics
1) Make a list of things to write about (this is today's topic)
2) What's happening in the world of quidditch? (a bit predictable, but acceptable for those who are grasping)
3) New London: What are its best and worst parts? (especially useful for those of you condemned to the country)
4) Ghosts: a menace to wizarding society, or sage mentors with much wisdom to offer? (Professor Binns excluded, of course)
5) Upcoming seasonal fashions (and are the hem-lengths on women's robes becoming rather scandalous?)
6) On that note: what sort of colours and/or clothing styles should one avoid if they have a rather unfortunate body shape? (I may not need this advice, but I feel I can provide it)
7) Aside from service, what are the virtues one ought to most foster in him or herself? (and is it ever wise to nurture a vice?)
8) Which creature is more useful: kneazle or owl? (or, for those who are concerned: which makes for better company?)
9) What should the title of the new Weird Sisters album be? (And when will they ever release it?)
10) And so on...

Well then, what other topics would the rest of you lot add to the list?

Did you see that package the Owl brought at supper? Massive, wasn't it? I think that Harrod's clerk I called on the fire must be new, or just nervous about filling an order for Malfoy, because judging from the weight of the box that's going to be a lot more food than what I actually asked for. Not that we'll have any trouble getting people to finish it off. The fifth years are eating a lot, have you noticed? Something to do with studying for OWLs, I suppose.

We'll start setting up after lessons tomorrow. I'll make Harry help me with the decorations, maybe Jeremy, too, and we'll get Vince and Greg to move the common room furniture if we need to. Teds will keep Blaise occupied elsewhere.

Would you two mind coming up with some games or other entertainment ideas, though? I know music and theatre was important back then, so Pansy, maybe we can get out our guitars. But even that can only go on for so long. Charades? Cards? I don't know.

Renaissance - bit of an odd theme, don't you think? Especially coming from Daphs. No wonder Lizzie didn't know what to do with it.

Pansy - see you after I'm done at the library?

Since I reckon a few blokes are going to be feeling a bit regretful that they took so long to open up their eyes to the fact that dancing is neither naff nor poncy, I figure it might be helpful if we compiled a list of people who are still without a date, just to make it easier for them to find one another, if they so choose.

Because get this: dancing with a girl is actually the opposite of poncy, as it so happens.

Year 4
Ron Weasley
Zacharias Smith
Katrina Bundy
Linus Moon
Mandy Brocklehurst
Seamus Finnigan
Daphne Greengrass*
Michael Corner
Gregory Goyle
Vincent Crabbe
Millicent Bulstrode
Theodore Nott

Year 5 (here's where things get murky, as I really only know about goings-on in Slytherin)
Erasmus Croaker
Troy Derwent
Jack Sloper
Horace Moon
Nerea Gray
Vicky Frobisher
Anthony Rickett
Ogden Begy

Year 6
Alfred Montague
Cassandra Calderwood
Miles Bletchley
Duncan Inglebee
Feodor Gallez
Geoffrey Hooper
Kenneth Towler

Year 7
Agnes Wright
Barnabas Bole
Josephina Gamp
Maxine O'Flaherty
Gemma Bundy
Faemarina Anderson
Herbert Fleet
Welhelmina Rigg
Horus Diggle
Russell Cadwadaller
Karoline Moon**
Penelope Clearwater**

* Daphs is only on the list as a technicality.
** Technically on the list, but disqualified as they're both seeing blokes who are already out of the school.


Who else have I missed? I didn't include third-years, but some of them might be available. If anyone knows about the students from Beauxbatons and Durmstrang, you can add their names here, too.

I was surprised to read the Head Girl's announcement about bullying, as I haven't noticed any behaviour that's more out of line from what we usually see at Hogwarts. But apparently others have noticed, which is unfortunate, given that we currently have guests whose impression of Hogwarts matters a great deal to some of us. Now that such a bright glaring light has been shined on the matter, we can only hope that it will soon die down.

If there are any first-year or visiting students who want to test out their spellcasting skills in an approved environment, they ought to consider attending duelling club on the second and fourth Tuesday of every month. Also, the NEWT students have duelling club on the first and third Tuesday, and they don't usually mind having an audience. Some of them have developed some dead impressive wand-work, too, which means it can be quite a show some nights.

So yeah, haven't seen this so-called bullying, but I have seen what Krum's been enduring. Last night I was on my way show him and some of the other Durmstrang students our quidditch trophies, when Marjoram Montague and Effie Stevens literally leapt out of the Armour Gallery while waving Bulgarian pennants and shouting the Bulgarian fight song. They had also charmed their hair to be white blond for some reason...to look like Veela? That's all I can figure, though they were just a bit far off on the resemblance.

It was possibly the most hideous spectacle I have ever witnessed. We all had our wands out in an instant - that's just what you do when someone jumps out from behind a suit of armour - and their faces went utterly white. And then when they saw Krum's expression - well, they figured out right quick that not a single one of us was amused. Stevens burst into tears and went wailing in the other direction, and Montague muttered an apology before scurrying off the same way. And then I had to apologise to Krum for their antics.

If people would stop being idiots being so ridiculous in the first place, we'd all be better off. Hopefully there won't be any incidents like that this weekend.

And speaking of - Harry and I will probably help with the set up after supper. Anyone else from CCF interesting in joining?

As I flip through the pages of my book for the last day or so, it's interesting to note that the majority of other people's entries (and my own) consist of Private Messages. As much as I use and value the PM system, I have to admit that I do miss the days when people would simply log their schedules, comment on recent events, or just say something utterly daft and laughable. People still do that, mind; just seems as if it all gets overwhelmed by the surplus of PMs.

So, in light of this observation, I am planning a return to more public postings, and I hope that some of you lot reading will do the same.

Getting closer to the end of the term is always an odd time. Everyone can feel the hols building in the air, and that, along with the pleasant weather, makes it really tempting to just faff about and play portkey, or go for a fly around the lake. But then there's all this building pressure too, with more revising, upcoming exams, and the summer YPL stuff.

So, if anyone wants to come to a combined study-and-games/music-after session, let me know and I'll see if I can organise something snitch.

Mother: I hope you received my package and that it found you in good spirits.

Crabbe: Where's my France-Bulgaria quidditch programme? If you've sopped up your juice with it or something then we will have problems, you and I. I hope you're not hanging onto it because you're actually trying to read it, because it's written in French, genius. Goyle was convinced for a while that it was just really strange handwriting.

Harry: Has your Father said yet what you'll be doing this summer? You'll get to stay with us for a while, right?

Since people have asked me about my interpretation of the events multiple times, I'm going to put this here and hope that it puts the matter to rest.

I don't know what, exactly, Crabbe, Goyle and Bulstrode were doing during the demonstration, only that they were arguing with each other about something. I know it was them because I remember looking over at them specifically, which is why I didn't see the hippogriff rearing back.

I didn't see Ron Weasley get in front of me (like I said, I was looking at my housemates). The only thing I registered next was a lot of screaming and flailing. Well, it might've been only one person screaming, but it's hard to say as it was right in my ear. And then Weasley was laying there all bloody and Professor Brutka was calming the creature and taking it away.

Whether by accident or with intent, the sudden appearance of Weasley's body in front of mine does seem to have prevented injury to my own person. I know that my Father and Mother are grateful for its sudden appearance, as am I.

I have no comment on the question of whether or not Weasley is, in the after math, trying to get more attention than is his due. I'm not sure it really matters, since the attention he is garnering isn't of the most positive nature. With that said, I think it time we all move on to other matters.

Unlike some people, I'm just fine with the results of the potions exam. My goal was to make the top ten and since I made the top five, I've gone beyond that. My next goal will to be higher in the top five.

If you were wondering why I wasn't at the music party last night, it's because I was writing a letter to Mr Cuthbert about my Nimbus 2001 and what I thought of it. I didn't have a bad thing to say, aside from the fact that it was too bad I wasn't allowed to bring it to school and show it to everyone. But that's not anything to do with Mr Cuthbert, of course, and I told him so.

Auntie Bella, if you're reading this thank you for replying to my Owl so fast, especially since Mother said you are feeling delicate lately.

AK is pretty brill so far. It's funny to see people running around and covering their ears - as if that could stop the hex somehow! I'm only worried because I woke up with part of my right hand all tingly with pins and needels. I went to Madame Pomfrey and she said I slept on it wrong and pinched a nerve and that I would just have to wait for it to go away. So far it hasn't.