I have to tell you how very cool it is to see all these children desperately clamoring to get their copy of a 759-page book. My daughter’s a voracious reader, so it’s not unusual to see her lugging around some hefty tome. But some of the people with whom we interacted last night? The ones with the hicksville drawl? Reeking of cigarettes? Many of them I never would have suspected of ANY kind of reading, educational, for pleasure, or otherwise. Really — some of those people were clearly from East Yeehaaville. But I’m just tickled freakin’ pink to see them reading something other than National Enquirer.

Anyway, my daughter has her copy, which was one of the first 20 or 30 sold at that store, and she screamed with delight when she got it. On the trip home, the girls used flashlights to read in the back of the car. We dropped off her friend, and then Griff stayed up who-knows-how-late reading (I checked on her at 5 a.m. and found her asleep on top of the book, with the light on). Then she was up bright and early this morning reading some more, taking a break only for a quick bagel for breakfast.

Griff came somewhat late to the Harry Potter party. She was in kindergarten or first grade when the first book came out, and initially I set out to read it to her at bedtime. Her active imagination quickly put that to a stop, as I do not particularly enjoy being awakened in the middle of the night by a terrified, screaming child who’s been having nightmares about Harry Potter bad guys. So, our copies of the HP books languished for a while, and it wasn’t until 5th grade that she decided she was ready to dive in and finally read them, long after many of her friends had. Like everyone else, she was totally drawn in, and quickly plowed her way through the first six books. Then she went back and re-read a couple of her favorites. Ever since, she’s been breathlessly awaiting book seven, even marking its release date on her calendar months ago, and making me promise to take her to the release party.

So last night I filled my parental duty, and took her to get the book that she’s been so desperately waiting for. She even dressed up in a Griffyndor costume, and she took part in the “Snape: Friend or Foe?” debate, the costume contest, and the trivia contest. She and her friend ran around, acted silly, and generally had a fabulous time. Me? I just wanted to find a chair. (At one point, I went and sat in the kids section on a low little bench, with my knees up next to my ears. And at my age, contortions like that have the potential to be fatal. But by that point, I would have happily parked my ass on a bed of nails, if it meant I could take my weight off my feet for a while.)

But now I’ve made my daughter happy, and I get to watch her delight as the final chapters in the Harry Potter saga unfold before her. How cool is that?

A friend once described people as either transmitters or receivers. You know those people that you can’t get a word in edgewise with? You stand there, your eyes glazing over, as you are pelted by a non-stop stream of blather, silently wishing that you could just scream out, “Will you please just SHUT THE HELL UP ALREADY?” These are transmitters. My daughter, who I love dearly, is a transmitter. Some days I feel as if I might bleed from the ears because she will not stop talking.

But I’m talking about internet transmitters. I know people who have MULTIPLE blogs, several of which they update EVERY DAY, or something close to it. And they can type up PAGES and PAGES of stuff every day. WTF? Who has TIME for that?

Me, I’m more of a receiver. Sure, I’ll have a conversation with you and all, but when it comes to the internet, I’m a receiver. I want information. Knowledge. FACTS.

I used to blame my lack of blogging on not having a blog, but handily, DH provided me with a blog that only served to prove that not having a blog was NOT the problem.

No, usually what happens is that by the time I get home, I’m only mildly pissed off, and then I start thinking about how I’d have to go get signed up on some blogging site and then set up my blog, and create a feaking About Me page and all that shit, and then I realize realize that my vent has already vented, and I wander off to read a book.

Fortunately for me, I’m married to a geek, and he’s been surfing this blog wave for a while now, so he set me up to blog on our website. Cool. I have to warn you that I’m definitely PG-13 at times, so prepare yourself.