I'd be the first one to agree

END OF BRAVE NEW WORLD

I am ready for it to be spring and summer, please! Personally, I've had enough of the cold weather to last me until next year, thank you very much.

However! I do love that we're embarking on the season of comfort and joy. I love comfort and joy, and don't be a Scrooge, I bet you do, too. Even if just deep down.

Maeve's List of Comfort and Joy

• Rereading a favourite book. It's like getting to visit old friends and reminisce over and relive all those sweet and happy warm fuzzy feelings! Happy sigh.
• Wrapping cold fingers around a mug of hot tea or coffee (or hot cocoa, for those of you who are members of the Hot Cocoa Brigade). Or Irish coffee, for those of us who are of age (but certainly not while at school!).
• Rugby striped knee-highs in colours like pink and purple and light blue. Even if it sometimes make me feel like I'm baiting pervy old men by rocking the prettied up schoolgirl look, I do happen to rock that look very well.
• Dancing! I know some of us are still recovering from the Harvest Dance, but the Christmas Dance is coming up very quickly, and the Christmas Dance always strikes me as quite romantic.
• Hufflepuff beating Ravenclaw next week! But perhaps I'm biased.

Tell me, Hogwarts. And assorted alumni and other old people. What's on your list of comfort and joy?

Why weren't any of those Did anyone see any about me Hello! I was wondering why I wasn't

I took down the awful thing that was said about me, thank you very much! Perhaps I should take it as a compliment that I was worthy enough to be insulted, because for the most part, it appears I was in good company!

Isn't the Slambook enough for you people?

And now I'll return to the library, where I'll be happily ensconced with my Charms notes. Professor Frobisher, bless her heart, always forges ahead without concern for sickness or for gossip, and I think she's a lovely role model for the rest of us.

To whom it may concern!

I have made a decision to not stop myself from wearing heels just because I already teeter too closely to six feet. And I don't care who asks "Aren't you tall enough already?" because I have decided I am confident enough to pull off four inch heels if I want to. And I do want to!

Fellow women of considerable height! Join with me. Let us buck conventional wisdom, and let us wear heels! If we're already towering over others, what do a few more inches matter? Let us embrace our regal natures.

And any man who feels threatened by our Amazonian statures can suck it.

Who's with me?

Also, thank you, Secret Santa, for the darling Welsh dragon. You know me too well!

I was browsing through a couple catalogs today, generating ideas for Harvest Dance costumes, so that I'll know what I need to order and what I need to look for during my Hogsmeade visit (Week after this one! I cannot wait!). I haven't yet decided, but I did want to also start on something that's more important than what I wear.

Would you like me to save a dance for you?

Blokes and girls are both welcome, so long as you want to dance. I will abide no wet blankets on the dancefloor. None! And if you're shy about dancing, I'm a terrific partner for bringing you out of your shell, I promise! I will ensure that you have fun!

Are dance cards trendy this year? If not, I'll just keep a list in my head, so either way, tell me if you want to dance!

And I love most of you you all, but the last thing this school needs is any additional premature explosion of hormonal drama, so I am very sorry, but I will not be accepting any requests for a formal date to this little promenade. Especially this early!

Oh, library, how I have missed you! Books, more books than one person could possibly read! Peace and quiet, more peace and quiet than I could possibly take advantage of! Miss Germaine, that delightful woman whose existence continually proves that it is indeed possible to be both sexy and well-read!

I am thrilled to be back at school, and I know this will be our best year yet. Our last year! (For those among us for whom that applies, at least.) Despite setbacks and inconveniences, despite petty little temper tantrums that people might throw, we should remember: this is the last year before the rest of our lives! We ought to be making the most of it. (And as a proud Yearbook votarist, I'd like to remind you that I'll be helping to chronicle the best moments of it, so stop running from the camera, please.)

Sexual politics are just as eyeroll-y as other types of politics. That's my sole oblique comment for the day!

Non-obliquely, I'm making pumpkin ice cream to celebrate the recrudescency of my favourite squash. Oh, ice cream machine, I will miss you most dearly when I return to school!

Annie, may I talk to you under a privacy ward for a moment?

Thanks a lot, Lucy, for not getting Head Girl and for not sharing that prefecty goodness with me any of your lovely dormmates.

Just kidding!

The only announcement I have, then, is that I cannot wait to get back to school and start NEWTs revision. I have new folders for each subject, I've been rewriting and organising my notes from the past year, and I am so going to get straight O's.

If anyone desires an Arithmancy revision partner, I would love to set up a schedule.

( Damn right, it's better than yours. )

( I don't know why I drink. I always either get laid or fired. )